Approved by His Excellency, Minister Teodoro Q. Pena, Minister for Natural Resources and sponsored by Hillesög AB in Sweden, it brought the Philippine Ministry of Natural Resources, The Philippine National Herbarium, the Rijksherbarium, and the Royal Botanic Gardens Kew together for three month intense exploration of the island.

Intense botanical research had only been done around Thumb Peak in mid Palawan, with some collections from St. Pauls Bay, Mt. Mantalingahan and a few small localities. The famous palm Vietchia merrillii was known to have come from Palawan.

47 locations were studied, 1870 trees, lianas and plants were collected; 861 bark & wood samples, 239 living plants and 35 algal collections. A total of 1870 herbarium specimens mostly in sets of ten (so, over 18 000 individuals sheets), 861 bark and wood samples and 239 living plants were collected from 47 localities in the primary rain-forests of Palawan. As specimen identification to species and to a lesser extent generic level still continues, only an estimate of the number of species is possible. This estimate is 750 species. In addition, 35 marine and freshwater diatom samples were collected. 348 diatom species were recorded and 4 new species described.

At least 8 species were new to science, 1 new genus & 6 new species to the Philippines, and 97 were new species of known genera to Palawan.

Research into the collections post 1985 have increased this number substantially.. New species continue to be described from the collected material.