Cinchona ledgeriana" had a yield of 8 to 13 percent quinine in bark grown in Dutch Indonesia which effectively out-competed the British Indian production. It was only later that the English saw the value and sought to obtain the seeds of "C. ledgeriana" from the Dutch. During World War II, the Japanese conquered Java and the United States lost access to the cinchona plantations that supplied war-critical quinine medication. Botanical expeditions – called Cinchona Missions – were launched in 1942-1944 to explore promising areas of South America in an effort to locate cinchona species that contained quinine and could be harvested
Jesuit's bark plant cinchona outside of South America. Jesuit's bark Jesuit's Bark, also known as cinchona bark, as Peruvian Bark, and as China Bark, is a former name of the most celebrated specific remedy for all forms of malaria. It is so named because it was obtained from the bark of several species of the genus "Cinchona", of the Rubiaceae family, that have been discovered at different times and are indigenous in the Western Andes of South America and were first described and introduced by Jesuit priests who did missionary work in Peru. Other terms referring to this preparation and its source