Ethnobotany and Conservation

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Ethnobotany and Conservation
Rattan harvest Southeast Asia
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Calculations

• 6330 value of fruit and latex harvested per
  hectare per year in Peru
• 490 sustainable harvest of timber so total
  value of 6820 per year
• 3184 tree farming in Brazil per hectare per
  year
• 2690 price per hectare of cattle ranching land
  in Brazil
• 148 per year profit from cattle ranching per
  hectare in Brazil
• 564 worth of medicine per hectare from 30 year
  old forest in Belize
• 3054 worth of medicine per hectare from 50 year
  old forest in Belize

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Map of the Caribbean Region
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Movie poster forThe MosquitoCoast - 1986
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Belize Ecoregions
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Belize Reserves
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Belize Ethnobotany

• 1988, the Belize Ethnobotany Project was
  initiated to inventory, understand and conserve
  as much ethnobotanical data as possible in a
  country that is undergoing rapid change largely
  due to a loss of natural habitat and erosion of
  existing cultures as the nation becomes more
  westernized
• Over 2000 plant samples have been sent to the US
  for testing by the National Cancer Institutes
  Developmental Therapeutics Program as it tests
  for anti-cancer and anti-HIV drugs

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Belize Ethnobotany

• 1992 the Belize Association of Traditional
  Healers was formed and Rosita Arvigo was elected
  its president - this group has been active in
  getting land preserved because, as they say, we
  cant do our work without our plants
• 2400 hectare ethno-biomedical forest reserve
  was set aside in June 1993 to preserve medicinal
  plants - it was intended to set aside an area
  where medicinal plants would flourish and allow
  young apprentices to learn how to identify and
  collect medicinal plants

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Rosita Arvigo with Mayan healer, the late Don
Elijo Panti - Belize
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Rosita Arvigo with herbalist Leopoldo Romero on
left and Michael Balick in center - Belize
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(No Transcript)
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Map of Western Samoa and Savaii Island
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Falealupo Covenant - 1989

• Funds donated from Forever Living Products from
  Phoenix, Arizona, and Murdock International in
  Springville, Utah and a firm that dealt in
  antique botanical prints James McCewan and
  Associates of London
• Donors renounced any rights to or interest in the
  rainforest and land and pledged to build the
  school in exchange for the village promising to
  protect the rainforest for 50 years
• Covenant allows ethnobotanists to investigate
  medicinal plants in the forest but mandates that
  33 percent of any income from any commercial
  discoveries be returned to the village

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Falealupo Rain Forest Preserve Savaii Island
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Homolanthus nutans source of anti-HIV drug
prostratin
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Prostratin

• Prostratin, a protein kinase C activator, was
  isolated from the stems of the small Samoan tree
  Homalanthus nutans.
• H. nutans plays an important role in Samoan
  ethnopharmacology the leaves are used to treat
  back pain, the root is used to treat diarrhea and
  the stem wood is used to treat yellow fever

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Ake Lilo prepares H. nutans bark for use in
traditional medicine for hepatitis - Samoa
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Map of Western Samoa and Savaii Island
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Tafua Rainforest Preserve

• A new foundation, Seacology, was formed to help
  preserve Pacific island rain forests and culture.
  
• Obtained funding from Swedish Nature Foundation
  and World Wildlife Fund that established Tafua
  Rain Forest Reserve and allowed a school and
  other village improvements to be built in Tafua.

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Future of Ethnobotanical Conservation

• There are two main concerns for
  ethno-conservation efforts - one is to preserve
  the land necessary for survival of indigenous
  people and the plants and animals they use
• The other is the preservation of indigenous
  cultures itself

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Future of Ethnobotanical Conservation

• C. Earle Smith has said that Ethnobotany is the
  sum total of human subsistence knowledge.
  Without a thorough understanding of the worlds
  plant resources, the human race would cease to
  exist.

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Brazil nut tree Bertholletia excelsa
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A castañero Brazil Nut collector with pile of
nut pods
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Open Brazil Nut pod showing the many nuts it
contains