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	<channel>
		<title>Conservation news</title>
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		<link>https://news.mongabay.com/list/medicinal-plants/</link>
		<description>Environmental science and conservation news</description>
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	<url>https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2020/05/16160320/cropped-mongabay_icon-32x32.png</url>
	<title>News on Medicinal Plants</title>
	<link>https://news.mongabay.com/list/medicinal-plants/</link>
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				<item>
					<title>Elders, conservationists race to record fading sacred ties to Philippines’ endemic birds</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/elders-conservationists-race-to-record-fading-sacred-ties-to-philippines-endemic-birds/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/elders-conservationists-race-to-record-fading-sacred-ties-to-philippines-endemic-birds/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>18 Aug 2026 19:55:13 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Keith Anthony Fabro]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Latoya Abulu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/08/18111008/Mindoro-boobook-2-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=326488</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Philippines, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Birds, Citizen Science, Community Forests, Community-based Conservation, Conservation, Culture, Education, Endangered Species, Environment, Indigenous Peoples, Medicinal Plants, Traditional Knowledge, Traditional Medicine, Traditional People, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[PUERTO GALERA, Philippines — The forest settles into a gentle rhythm as the trail climbs into the Iraya Mangyan ancestral domain in Puerto Galera town, on the Philippines’ Mindoro Island. Only birdsong breaks the silence as towering trees sway overhead. A clear stream tumbles across the trail over smooth rocks. Ahead walks 43-year-old Lenito Pampilo. Every [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[PUERTO GALERA, Philippines — The forest settles into a gentle rhythm as the trail climbs into the Iraya Mangyan ancestral domain in Puerto Galera town, on the Philippines’ Mindoro Island. Only birdsong breaks the silence as towering trees sway overhead. A clear stream tumbles across the trail over smooth rocks. Ahead walks 43-year-old Lenito Pampilo. Every few steps, he stops — not because the climb is difficult, but because the forest is speaking, he says. He points to an unseen bird in the canopy. Another answers from farther uphill. For him, each call carries meaning. “Our elders taught us these birds,” he tells Mongabay. Pampilo, an Iraya community leader and ecotrail guide, has spent much of his life in these mountains. His knowledge goes beyond recognizing species. “Some birds signal changing weather, warn of danger or carry messages between the living and spirit worlds,” he says. “Trees, streams and ridges also hold stories passed from one generation to the next.” For the Iraya, the forest is a largely unwritten living archive. Lenito Pampilo, an Iraya community leader and ecotrail guide, has spent much of his life in the mountains located in the Iraya Mangyan ancestral lands. Image by Keith Anthony Fabro. For the Iraya, the forest is a largely unwritten living archive. Image courtesy of Center for Conservation Innovations PH Inc. As elders age and fewer young people learn beside them, the Center for Conservation Innovations Philippines (CCIPH) is helping Iraya knowledge holders document wildlife, medicinal plants and culturally important places&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/elders-conservationists-race-to-record-fading-sacred-ties-to-philippines-endemic-birds/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/elders-conservationists-race-to-record-fading-sacred-ties-to-philippines-endemic-birds/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326488</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>How a Brazilian Indigenous ethnobotanist &#038; elders recorded their people’s medicinal knowledge</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/how-the-first-published-indigenous-ethnobotanist-elders-recorded-their-peoples-medicinal-knowledge/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/how-the-first-published-indigenous-ethnobotanist-elders-recorded-their-peoples-medicinal-knowledge/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>13 Aug 2026 07:00:56 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Karla Mendes]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Latoya Abulu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/07/03145846/banner-2-768x512.png" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=322177</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Brazil, Latin America, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Botany, Conservation, Culture, Education, Indigenous Peoples, Medicinal Plants, Medicine, Plants, Research, Science, Traditional Knowledge, Traditional Medicine, and Traditional People]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[CARAMURU/PARAGUASSU INDIGENOUS TERRITORY, Brazil — Looking at the landscape of dry and cleared mountains around her house, Marta Xavier de Oliveira remembered when it was a forest. &#8220;When we got sick, that&#8217;s where we got our medicine from,&#8221; Oliveira, known as Dona Marta, 87, told Mongabay. An Indigenous elder of the Kariri-Sapuyá people, she stands [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[CARAMURU/PARAGUASSU INDIGENOUS TERRITORY, Brazil — Looking at the landscape of dry and cleared mountains around her house, Marta Xavier de Oliveira remembered when it was a forest. &#8220;When we got sick, that&#8217;s where we got our medicine from,&#8221; Oliveira, known as Dona Marta, 87, told Mongabay. An Indigenous elder of the Kariri-Sapuyá people, she stands amid her ancestral land in Brazil&#8217;s northeastern Bahia state and her vegetable garden where she’s kept several medicinal plants going. Beside her is an embaúba tree (Cecropia pachystachya), used to treat diabetes and prostate issues, in the backyard of her house in the village of Caramuru. &#8220;It was all over there. They knocked everything down. Everything was cleared and they destroyed the forest.&#8221; Some native species, including embaúba, were planted here 44 years ago. Others, however, disappeared from the territory over the past decades, when outsiders invaded the area and cleared the forests for cattle pastures, Dona Marta said. She cited a specific plant: puaia, used to treat snake bites, plague — an illness elders said includes fever, headaches, and leaves the body all twisted — and various other diseases. &#8220;It was there in the woods,&#8221; she said, pointing to the cleared mountains. &#8220;It&#8217;s gone.&#8221; On Dec. 27, 2025, Dona Marta passed away. Her knowledge, however, is alive today in a study published in the Journal of Ethnobiology and Ethomedicine, which cited her. The paper is authored by Indigenous ethnobotanist Hemerson Dantas dos Santos Pataxó HãHãHãi and Eliana Rodrigues, a professor and coordinator of ethnobotanical&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/how-the-first-published-indigenous-ethnobotanist-elders-recorded-their-peoples-medicinal-knowledge/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-322177</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Secret Amazon species may be new source of ibogaine for addiction treatment</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/06/secret-amazon-species-may-be-new-source-of-ibogaine-for-addiction-treatment/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/06/secret-amazon-species-may-be-new-source-of-ibogaine-for-addiction-treatment/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>30 Jun 2026 17:49:45 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Jenny Gonzales]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Alexandre de Santi]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/06/30133255/5-Researcher-Ricardo-Marques-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=322102</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Africa, Amazon, Brazil, Latin America, South America, and West Africa]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Bioeconomy, Conservation, Environment, Health, Medicinal Plants, Medicine, Natural Resources, Plants, Research, Science, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[A dismissed pasture weed may be key to easing drug addictions, but a researcher is keeping it a closely guarded secret for now.]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[For generations, the Bwiti religion in Gabon has revered ibogaine, a psychedelic alkaloid extracted from the iboga shrub (Tabernanthe iboga). While ancient cultures have long held the plant as sacred and understood its spiritual depth, modern science has only recently been exploring its potential as a clinical tool to treat drug addiction. Recent trials and historical accounts suggest ibogaine can reduce withdrawal symptoms and the craving for drugs like heroin and methadone, offering a neurobiological &#8220;reset.&#8221; Although ibogaine’s medicinal use is still largely unregulated, the global demand for this anti-addiction agent has pushed the African iboga plant into danger. The shrub takes up to 30 years to mature and yields just a single gram of ibogaine; traditional extraction usually requires uprooting the plant, leading to its destruction. This scarcity has fueled poaching and smuggling, prompting the Gabonese government to prohibit its export. Now, a breakthrough has emerged from the Amazon Rainforest, centered on an undisclosed species. The identity of this plant remains a closely guarded secret by Brazilian researcher Ricardo Marques, who spent nearly two years locating it and studying its ecology. This species contains a chemical precursor that can be transformed into ibogaine using a new, potentially sustainable harvesting method that allows the plant to regenerate after extraction. By keeping the plant&#8217;s name a secret while training local families in its collection, Marques says he hopes to create a permanent, ethical supply of ibogaine without repeating the ecological harm seen in Africa. Up until now, the only alternative to&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/06/secret-amazon-species-may-be-new-source-of-ibogaine-for-addiction-treatment/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/06/secret-amazon-species-may-be-new-source-of-ibogaine-for-addiction-treatment/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-322102</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>What’s jimbu? The herb that bolsters an iconic Nepali dish could also help save snow leopards</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/06/whats-jimbu-the-herb-that-bolsters-an-iconic-nepali-dish-could-also-help-save-snow-leopards/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/06/whats-jimbu-the-herb-that-bolsters-an-iconic-nepali-dish-could-also-help-save-snow-leopards/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>30 Jun 2026 10:48:04 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Bibek Bhandari]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Sharon Guynup]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/06/30091143/jimbu-Allium-przewalskianum-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=322085</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Himalayas, Nepal, and South Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Agriculture, Biodiversity, Cats, Conservation, Culture, Environment, Food, Habitat, Human-wildlife Conflict, Indigenous Peoples, Medicinal Plants, Natural Resources, Plants, Snow Leopards, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[KATHMANDU — In Nepal, there&#8217;s a popular saying: “dal bhat power, 24 hour.” It refers to a humble plateful of rice and soupy lentils that Nepalis swear by, both at home and across the diaspora. It&#8217;s fuel for the body and a taste of home where it’s a staple meal for lunch and dinner. Now, [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[KATHMANDU — In Nepal, there&#8217;s a popular saying: “dal bhat power, 24 hour.” It refers to a humble plateful of rice and soupy lentils that Nepalis swear by, both at home and across the diaspora. It&#8217;s fuel for the body and a taste of home where it’s a staple meal for lunch and dinner. Now, an aromatic herb from the Himalayas that gives the Nepali staple its distinctive flavor offers Indigenous communities a potential promise: An alternative source of income and fewer conflicts with the iconic snow leopards that live in these mountain peaks. How so? The residents of Phu Valley who cultivate jimbu (Allium przewalskianum) in this high-altitude settlement, located in the trans-Himalayan region of Manang that borders China’s Tibet region will tell you. They grow this herb, also known as Himalayan chive, as a cash crop — and as a way to help save “the big cat of the mountains.” Dried jimbu is usually fried in ghee, or clarified butter, and poured over simmering dal for an earthy flavor. “Whenever we talk about dal bhat, the most famous of them all is the Thakali version prepared by the Thakali communities of the mountains,” said Shailendra Thakali, an expert in environmental conservation, tourism and livelihoods, referring to a version of the dish made by Indigenous people known for their traditional cuisines. “And the Thakali dal bhat owes its unique taste and aroma to jimbu,” Thakali added. Until recently, residents foraged this herb from steep, risky slopes. They used some&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/06/whats-jimbu-the-herb-that-bolsters-an-iconic-nepali-dish-could-also-help-save-snow-leopards/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/06/whats-jimbu-the-herb-that-bolsters-an-iconic-nepali-dish-could-also-help-save-snow-leopards/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-322085</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Global pressure on ayahuasca threatens Amazonian plants and knowledge systems</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/06/global-pressure-on-ayahuasca-threatens-amazonian-plants-and-knowledge-systems/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/06/global-pressure-on-ayahuasca-threatens-amazonian-plants-and-knowledge-systems/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>23 Jun 2026 20:38:06 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Carlos Minuano]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Xavier Bartaburu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/06/23203123/AP18157600830602-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=321692</guid>

					
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biocultural Diversity, Biodiversity Hotspots, Community Forests, Conservation, Consumption, Controversial, Culture, Globalization, Indigenous Peoples, International Trade, Medicinal Plants, Overconsumption, Overexploitation, Plants, Rainforests, Religions, Traditional Medicine, and Traditional People]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[“One of the world’s largest pharmacies is being destroyed,” says Benki Piyãko, a leader of the Ashaninka Indigenous people in the Brazilian state of Acre. The warning points to multiple threats advancing on the Amazon but also to growing debate surrounding one of the so-called forest medicines: ayahuasca. This Indigenous beverage with psychedelic properties is [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[“One of the world’s largest pharmacies is being destroyed,” says Benki Piyãko, a leader of the Ashaninka Indigenous people in the Brazilian state of Acre. The warning points to multiple threats advancing on the Amazon but also to growing debate surrounding one of the so-called forest medicines: ayahuasca. This Indigenous beverage with psychedelic properties is usually prepared from two native plants: the caapi vine or mariri (Banisteriopsis caapi) and the leaves of the chacrona plant (Psychotria viridis). According to Indigenous leaders and experts, these species are facing increasing pressure and signs of scarcity in some areas. Called kamarãpe by the Ashaninka people, ayahuasca has been used by Indigenous peoples across the Amazon for centuries. It has crossed borders for decades, ceasing to circulate exclusively in its original contexts. Today, it can be found in urban religious centers, therapeutic retreats, and international psychedelic tourism circuits. Scientists and pharmaceutical companies are also turning their attention to this ancestral beverage, which already shows evidence of therapeutic potential for different mental health disorders such as depression and substance addiction. But increasing global interest is also creating concerns. As demand grows, so has the ayahuasca supply chain, without a corresponding growth in management or oversight. In different parts of the Amazon, there are signs of pressure on the species used to prepare the beverage, often collected without planning. At the same time, increasing consumption in nontraditional contexts raises concerns about ancestral knowledge being commodified for the market. The main problem seems to lie in how&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/06/global-pressure-on-ayahuasca-threatens-amazonian-plants-and-knowledge-systems/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/06/global-pressure-on-ayahuasca-threatens-amazonian-plants-and-knowledge-systems/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-321692</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>In Indonesia, a coastal vine used as medicine now signals ecological decline</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/04/in-indonesia-a-coastal-vine-used-as-medicine-now-signals-ecological-decline/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/04/in-indonesia-a-coastal-vine-used-as-medicine-now-signals-ecological-decline/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>09 Apr 2026 11:34:10 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Christopel Paino]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/04/09111444/Ipomoea-pes-caprae-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=317249</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Indonesia, North Sulawesi, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Coastal Ecosystems, Conservation, Environment, Erosion, Flowers, Marine Conservation, Medicinal Plants, Oceans, Plants, and Traditional Medicine]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[SUMALATA, Indonesia — Following encounters while diving, Gusnar Ismail has long turned to the morning glory plants growing on sandbanks here on the north of Indonesia’s Sulawesi Island. “When I get stung or stabbed by an animal in the sea, I’ll go straight away to look for batata to use as medicine,” Gusnar told Mongabay [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[SUMALATA, Indonesia — Following encounters while diving, Gusnar Ismail has long turned to the morning glory plants growing on sandbanks here on the north of Indonesia’s Sulawesi Island. “When I get stung or stabbed by an animal in the sea, I’ll go straight away to look for batata to use as medicine,” Gusnar told Mongabay Indonesia on March 14. Around the world, coastal communities have long self-medicated with what Gusnar calls batata to treat common ailments. The fast-growing batata vine (Ipomoea pes-caprae), commonly known as beach morning glory or bayhops, scrambles across beach dunes, unfurling fuchsia flowers throughout the tropics. Aboriginal societies have gathered the shoots and leaves to treat stings in waters off what is now Australia. In India, the plant is a ceremonial ingredient in countering evil spirits. Researchers from South Korea in a study published in 2022 in the journal Marine Drugs found an array of applications from beach morning glory around the world’s tropical and subtropical coastlines. “The dried leaves of the plant are used to treat arthritis in Nigeria, while the young leaves are boiled in coconut oil to treat sores in Indonesia,” the researchers noted. Beach morning glory is an abundant and resilient vine that carpets tropical beaches around the world. But where coastlines are upended by plantations, sand mining, infrastructure or heavy erosion, the green shoots and purple flowers can disappear from shorelines. “I&#8217;ve been observing the disappearance of coastal batata for a long time,” Gusnar told Mongabay Indonesia. Here on the northern&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/04/in-indonesia-a-coastal-vine-used-as-medicine-now-signals-ecological-decline/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-317249</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Sustainable trade in wild plants benefits people and planet (commentary)</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/03/sustainable-trade-in-wild-plants-benefits-people-and-planet-commentary/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/03/sustainable-trade-in-wild-plants-benefits-people-and-planet-commentary/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>02 Mar 2026 15:13:34 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Richard Scobey]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Erik Hoffner]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/03/02145620/cordyceps-harvest_Sushil-Mainali_ANSAB-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=315053</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Global]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Commentary, Conservation, Economics, Environment, Food, Forest Products, International Trade, Medicinal Plants, Nutrition, Plants, and Trade]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Every day, millions of people harvest wild plants for their health, nutrition and livelihoods, yet many of the species that sustain them are quietly slipping toward extinction. As World Wildlife Day approaches this March 3, medicinal and aromatic plants take center stage: a group of wild species essential to both human well-being and ecological balance, they [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Every day, millions of people harvest wild plants for their health, nutrition and livelihoods, yet many of the species that sustain them are quietly slipping toward extinction. As World Wildlife Day approaches this March 3, medicinal and aromatic plants take center stage: a group of wild species essential to both human well-being and ecological balance, they are too often overlooked in global conservation conversations. These plants grow in the wild and are harvested for their healing and well-being properties. They are widely used in modern and traditional medicines, cosmetic and food products, and the World Health Organization notes their particular importance in developing countries, where up to 95% of people rely on traditional medicine for primary health care. Furthermore, according to the Intergovernmental Science–Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES), “Wild plants, algae and fungi provide food, nutritional diversity and income for an estimated one in five people around the world, in particular women, children, landless farmers and others in vulnerable situations.” Many familiar species — such as American ginseng, licorice, argan, candelilla and frankincense — are part of our daily lives, found in kitchen cupboards, medicine cabinets and bathrooms, although mostly hidden from view. But global conservation assessments have only been carried out for a fraction of the many thousands of medicinal and aromatic plants in use. Of those that have been assessed, many are threatened with extinction due to overharvesting, and it is likely this is only the tip of the iceberg. View a report about sustainable harvesting of star anise in&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/03/sustainable-trade-in-wild-plants-benefits-people-and-planet-commentary/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-315053</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Endangered knowledge and endangered plants: Threats to Indigenous medicinal traditions in Borneo</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/endangered-knowledge-and-endangered-plants-threats-to-indigenous-medicinal-traditions-in-borneo/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/endangered-knowledge-and-endangered-plants-threats-to-indigenous-medicinal-traditions-in-borneo/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>01 Dec 2025 00:42:10 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Cassidy Beach]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rhett Butler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/11/29162522/beach_indigenous_medicine_1-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=310375</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Malaysia, Sarawak, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Botany, Environment, Indigenous Peoples, Medicinal Plants, Medicine, Plants, and Traditional Knowledge]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In Borneo’s dense rainforest, some communities of Punan people still find their medicine among the trees. For generations the forest has been their living pharmacy, with each medicinal plant tied to tradition. But as modern pressures grow, both the forest and the knowledge it shelters are slipping away. To understand what’s at stake, researchers from [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In Borneo’s dense rainforest, some communities of Punan people still find their medicine among the trees. For generations the forest has been their living pharmacy, with each medicinal plant tied to tradition. But as modern pressures grow, both the forest and the knowledge it shelters are slipping away. To understand what’s at stake, researchers from Universiti Putra Malaysia traveled to Punan communities in the Malaysian state of Sarawak to document traditional medicinal practices and identify the plants behind them. The results were recently published in the journal Tropical Conservation Science. Tribes in Sarawak, Borneo live in stilted longhouses often along rivers. Historically housing one kin group, today a longhouse is typically home to multiple extended families of mixed heritage. Photo by Beatrice Anak Kayok Thirteen Indigenous Punan people guided ecologist Keeren Sundara Rajoo and his colleagues through the forest, locating plants and sharing a “spider web” of stories and knowledge. “When a plant species disappears, it’s not only a biological loss,” Sundara Rajoo said. “It also erases part of a community’s heritage and traditional knowledge system.” Indigenous communities in Sarawak live in stilted longhouses, home to multiple families in private bilik rooms that open onto a shared ruai, the center of communal life. Another tribe’s longhouse may stand only 40 kilometers (25 miles) away, Sundara Rajoo said, yet each group preserves its own system of beliefs, unique language, and festivals. Among these communities, the Punan are struggling to hold onto some of these cultural traditions. They believe their medicine draws&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/12/endangered-knowledge-and-endangered-plants-threats-to-indigenous-medicinal-traditions-in-borneo/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-310375</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>IDB financed meat &#038; poultry company that polluted Indigenous Ecuador lands: Report</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/idb-financed-meat-poultry-company-that-polluted-indigenous-ecuador-lands-report/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/idb-financed-meat-poultry-company-that-polluted-indigenous-ecuador-lands-report/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>21 Nov 2025 11:31:50 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Ana Cristina Alvarado]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Alexandra Popescu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/11/21111703/Portada-BID-1-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=309959</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Ecuador, Latin America, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[agribusiness, Farming, Food Industry, Health, Indigenous Peoples, Medicinal Plants, Pollution, Traditional Knowledge, Water, and Water Pollution]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In Peripa, an Indigenous Tsáchila village in Ecuador, there are still traditional healers, but medicinal plants are disappearing. Rivers no longer heal — instead, they make people sick. In the late 1990s, the company Pronaca set up pig farms nearby, in the province of Santo Domingo de los Tsáchilas, southwest of Quito. Soon after, residents [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In Peripa, an Indigenous Tsáchila village in Ecuador, there are still traditional healers, but medicinal plants are disappearing. Rivers no longer heal — instead, they make people sick. In the late 1990s, the company Pronaca set up pig farms nearby, in the province of Santo Domingo de los Tsáchilas, southwest of Quito. Soon after, residents noticed that surface and groundwater sources were no longer safe. After almost 30 years in which locals’ complaints to Ecuador’s state institutions remained unanswered, a new report on Pronaca confirms decades of pollution and violations in the Tsáchila Indigenous Territory. The report, released in September, was prepared by the Independent Consultation and Investigation Mechanism (MICI) of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) Group. “Water was one of the main sources of power for the poné [healers], and purification baths were performed in the rivers. Now, if someone visits us and goes into the river, they will come out with a skin disease,” Ricardo Calazacón, a Tsáchila resident of Peripa, told Mongabay Latam. “If there are no reparations, what will happen to us, since most of us are healers and farmers?” he asked. Calazacón and his family have been leading the defense of their ancestral territory for 25 years. For them, the MICI report represents a victory, but they recognize that the claims will not be resolved until they obtain reparations. Ricardo Calazacón is among the Tsáchila Indigenous people seeking reparations after decades of pollution. Image courtesy of Ricardo Calazacón. The IDB entered the picture when it&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/idb-financed-meat-poultry-company-that-polluted-indigenous-ecuador-lands-report/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-309959</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Top ethnobotanist Mark Plotkin&#8217;s COP30 reflections on Amazon conservation (analysis)</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/top-ethnobotanist-mark-plotkins-cop30-reflections-on-amazon-conservation-analysis/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/top-ethnobotanist-mark-plotkins-cop30-reflections-on-amazon-conservation-analysis/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>17 Nov 2025 21:45:26 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Mark J. Plotkin]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Erik Hoffner]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/11/17210100/Suriname-2-e1763414931233-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=309585</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Amazon, Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Latin America, Peru, South America, and Suriname]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Analysis, Biodiversity, Botany, Commentary, Conservation, Development, Environment, Forest Products, Forests, Happy-upbeat Environmental, Indigenous Peoples, Land Rights, Medicinal Plants, Medicine, Rainforests, Research, Sustainable Development, Threats To Rainforests, Traditional Knowledge, Traditional Medicine, Traditional People, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Having studied the healing plants and peoples of tropical South America for well over four decades, I am often asked, “What is the conservation status of the Amazon Rainforest? Is the glass half-full or half-empty?” My reply never changes. “By definition, any glass that is half-full is half-empty!” When I first traveled to the Amazon [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Having studied the healing plants and peoples of tropical South America for well over four decades, I am often asked, “What is the conservation status of the Amazon Rainforest? Is the glass half-full or half-empty?” My reply never changes. “By definition, any glass that is half-full is half-empty!” When I first traveled to the Amazon in the 1970s, the world was a different place. Most people thought of the rainforest, if they thought of it at all, as a green hell to be avoided at all costs. Soon thereafter, public perception of tropical rainforests shifted dramatically, driven by the emerging modern environmental movement. Tropical forest and river in Suriname. Image courtesy of Mark J. Plotkin. Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring in 1962 and Earth Day in 1970 were milestones in generating global awareness and concern over deforestation, pesticides, pollution and species extinction, particularly in the industrialized world. However, Western scientists like Tom Lovejoy, Richard Schultes and E.O. Wilson — as well as Brazilian scientists like Marcio Ayres, Paulo Nogueiro-Neto and Paulo Vanzolini — presented a compelling case that the biological richness and fragility of tropical forests merited at least as much attention as ecosystems in the temperate regions. These scientists reframed the global image of Amazonia from “green hell” to “treasure trove of biodiversity.” The media also played a positive role. The vast scale of burning and clearing — turning a green wonderland into a red desert through major development projects like ill-planned dams or road building — shocked and horrified&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/top-ethnobotanist-mark-plotkins-cop30-reflections-on-amazon-conservation-analysis/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-309585</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>The uncertain future of DRC’s traditional medicine, a heritage to save (commentary)</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/the-uncertain-future-of-drcs-traditional-medicine-a-heritage-to-save-commentary/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/the-uncertain-future-of-drcs-traditional-medicine-a-heritage-to-save-commentary/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>06 Nov 2025 18:24:32 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Blaise Kasereka Makuta]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Karen Coates]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/11/05201254/Trema_orientale_257131590-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=308888</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Letters to the Future]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Africa, Central Africa, and Democratic Republic Of Congo]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Climate Change, Medicinal Plants, Medicine, Plants, Traditional Knowledge, and Traditional Medicine]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[&#160; Congolese traditional medicine is disappearing. Not due to a lack of usefulness, but due to a lack of space in an increasingly standardized medical world. Faced with the rise of modern medicine, supported by institutions and universities, ancestral knowledge is being forgotten and sometimes even scorned. Yet, in rural areas where hospitals are scarce [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In this series, Our Letters to the Future, the sixth cohort of Mongabay’s Y. Eva Tan Conservation Reporting Fellows share their views on environmental journalism, conservation and the future for their generation, amid multiple planetary crises. Each commentary is a personal reflection, based on individual fellows’ experiences in their home communities and the insights gained through the past six months of the fellowship. The series spans the Global South — Malaysia, India, Colombia, Brazil, Nigeria and the Democratic Republic of Congo — showcasing a broad diversity of ideas and the common ground these young environmental journalists share as they embark on their careers. &nbsp; Congolese traditional medicine is disappearing. Not due to a lack of usefulness, but due to a lack of space in an increasingly standardized medical world. Faced with the rise of modern medicine, supported by institutions and universities, ancestral knowledge is being forgotten and sometimes even scorned. Yet, in rural areas where hospitals are scarce and medicines expensive, it is traditional healers who provide care, relief and support. How can it be explained that this medicine, rooted in local realities, is now relegated to the background? This is an issue I know from experience, in my family and community. In the Tembo tribe of South Kivu, to which I belong, traditional medicine relies on a deep understanding of plants, natural cycles and community rites. I had a friend in the village who caught chickenpox. He was taken to a traditional healer, who treated him with a wash&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/11/the-uncertain-future-of-drcs-traditional-medicine-a-heritage-to-save-commentary/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-308888</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>In Nepal’s hills, a fight brews over the country’s biggest iron deposit</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/10/in-nepals-hills-a-fight-brews-over-the-countrys-biggest-iron-deposit/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/10/in-nepals-hills-a-fight-brews-over-the-countrys-biggest-iron-deposit/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>17 Oct 2025 08:36:28 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Sonam Lama Hyolmo]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Abhaya Raj Joshi]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/10/16140316/7-1-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=307814</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Nepal, and South Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Biodiversity Hotspots, Chemicals, Community Forests, Conservation, Culture, Development, Endangered Species, Environment, Environmental Law, Fungi, Green, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, Infrastructure, Land Rights, Medicinal Plants, Medicine, Mining, Pollution, Social Justice, and Water Pollution]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[KATHMANDU — When the monsoon arrives in Jhumlabang village in Nepal’s far west, 35-year-old Til Kumari B.K. spends hours in the community forest harvesting mushrooms. The rest of the year, she goes there to collect bark from the allo plant (Girardinia diversifolia), or Himalayan nettle, which is processed into a fiber for weaving fabric. During [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[KATHMANDU — When the monsoon arrives in Jhumlabang village in Nepal’s far west, 35-year-old Til Kumari B.K. spends hours in the community forest harvesting mushrooms. The rest of the year, she goes there to collect bark from the allo plant (Girardinia diversifolia), or Himalayan nettle, which is processed into a fiber for weaving fabric. During the dry season, Til Kumari also tends her farm. “The farm feeds my family, while money from the mushrooms and fibers help pay for books and pens for my four children,” she says. But all that could soon change, with her once sleepy village now in the headlines as home to Nepal’s “biggest iron deposit.” The area, which once provided copper ores for community use, now sits on a potential iron deposit. There’s no full-scale mining operation here, for now. But officials have recently granted a concession, and community members are crying foul over what they say is the lack of meaningful community consultation, threats of displacement, and potential environmental harm even — as the government and mining companies emphasize economic development and resource self-sufficiency. Government and company sources told Mongabay that Jhumlabang mine which contain a hematite deposit of around 200 million tonnes is twice as big as Dhaubadi iron mine that has an estimated 96.3 million metric tons of iron ores and that the new mine has the capacity to create job opportunities and reduce dependency on iron imports from neighboring countries. But first it would have to overcome stern opposition from locals,&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/10/in-nepals-hills-a-fight-brews-over-the-countrys-biggest-iron-deposit/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-307814</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>In DRC’s Kivu region, the moringa tree offers valuable health benefits</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/10/in-drcs-kivu-region-the-moringa-tree-offers-valuable-health-benefits/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/10/in-drcs-kivu-region-the-moringa-tree-offers-valuable-health-benefits/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>09 Oct 2025 16:32:45 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Blaise Kasereka Makuta]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Karen Coates]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[africa]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Food systems]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/10/09074733/Moringa_oleifera_flower-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=307287</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Africa, Central Africa, and Democratic Republic Of Congo]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Agriculture, Agroecology, Biodiversity, Environment, Farming, Food, food security, Happy-upbeat Environmental, Health, Medicinal Plants, Plants, Traditional Knowledge, and Trees]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Moringa, most often associated with its native region of India, is also a valuable plant found thousands of miles away in the Kivu region of the Democratic Republic of Congo. Locally, it plays a crucial role in the production of medicines in traditional, traditional-modern (a combination of old and new) and modern medicine. According to [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Moringa, most often associated with its native region of India, is also a valuable plant found thousands of miles away in the Kivu region of the Democratic Republic of Congo. Locally, it plays a crucial role in the production of medicines in traditional, traditional-modern (a combination of old and new) and modern medicine. According to several local healers and patients, thanks to its therapeutic properties, moringa can be used to treat a variety of illnesses such as diabetes, muscle pain, sexual weakness and many others. “Apart from its medicinal properties, moringa has numerous benefits; it is a naturally fertilizing tree,” Jackeline Muderwa, a 69-year-old woman and healer from the Mugunga neighborhood in Goma, explained in an interview with Mongabay. She associates it with the Belgian colonial period around the mid-20th century. “The Belgians planted it in their gardens and used it to heal their certain diseases. I believe that is when we became aware of its usefulness. Most of the time, even in the bush, its presence testified to the ancestral presence of a person in that place who may have since moved away.&#8221; Moringa oleifera a fast-growing deciduous tree of the Moringaceae family. Although it is globally classified as a species of least concern on the IUCN Red List, this tree requires special attention. It is primarily cultivated in semiarid, tropical and subtropical areas. (Left) Moringa oleifera, a tree species native to India but also used in DRC for medicinal purposes. (Right) Moringa seeds. All parts of the plant&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/10/in-drcs-kivu-region-the-moringa-tree-offers-valuable-health-benefits/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-307287</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Amazon jambu blends tradition and science for numbing flavors and healthcare</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/08/amazon-jambu-blends-tradition-and-science-for-numbing-flavors-and-healthcare/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/08/amazon-jambu-blends-tradition-and-science-for-numbing-flavors-and-healthcare/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>18 Aug 2025 14:34:48 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Sarah Brown]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Alexandre de Santi]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Food systems]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/08/18131045/Acmella-oleracea-1-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=304465</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Amazon, Brazil, Latin America, and South America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Bioeconomy, Botany, Conservation, Culture, Environment, Farming, Food, food security, Indigenous Peoples, Medicinal Plants, Natural Resources, Plants, Soy, Traditional Knowledge, and Traditional People]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Brazil's bioeconomy efforts are unlocking surprising global applications for a homegrown plant known as a local remedy and seasoning.]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[The jambu plant is native to the Amazon Rainforest, where it’s renowned for its numbing and tingling effect when eaten. This characteristic has made it a main ingredient in many northern Brazilian dishes and drinks, as well as a traditional remedy for Indigenous communities living in Amazonian areas. But the benefits of the plant, Acmella oleracea, go even further: boosted by new studies, it’s now becoming a key ingredient of Brazil’s growing bioeconomy, thanks to researchers’ ability to turn local biodiversity and traditional knowledge into sustainable products with a huge socioeconomic impact. One of the initiatives is led by scientists from the Supercritical Technology Laboratory (Labtecs) at the Federal University of Pará (UFPA). Since 2019, they’ve been developing new applications to turn jambu-based products into bio-innovations, relying on techniques passed through Indigenous knowledge. So far, they’ve created a fast-dissolving oral film that relieves dry mouth in cancer patients; an anti-aging facial cream; an intimate lubricant and gels with stimulating effects; and an alcohol-free mouthwash. New research is even exploring jambu’s anti-arrhythmic activity property 一 that is, its potential for correcting abnormal heartbeat frequency. “It has truly unique characteristics,” Ana Paula Silva, a food science and technology researcher at UFPA, told Mongabay. “It’s an incredibly versatile plant with applications in cosmetics, medicine and functional foods. Very few native species offer such a wide range of possibilities.” Researcher Ana Paula Silva has been studying jambu for several years, from cultivation to finding the best ways to deliver the product to consumers. Image&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/08/amazon-jambu-blends-tradition-and-science-for-numbing-flavors-and-healthcare/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/08/amazon-jambu-blends-tradition-and-science-for-numbing-flavors-and-healthcare/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-304465</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Filipino communities use vast variety of endemic plants for health: Study</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/08/filipino-communities-use-vast-variety-of-endemic-plants-for-health-study/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/08/filipino-communities-use-vast-variety-of-endemic-plants-for-health-study/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>12 Aug 2025 17:58:52 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Keith Anthony Fabro]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Latoya Abulu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/08/12083428/Momordica_charantia_24042014_2-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=304095</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Philippines, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Botany, Conservation, Culture, Deforestation, Environment, Health, Indigenous Peoples, Medicinal Plants, Medicine, Plantations, Traditional Knowledge, Traditional Medicine, Traditional People, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In the forested highlands of Mindanao Island in the southern Philippines, Mingay Dakias knows exactly where to find medicine — not in modern health clinics but in the leaves, roots and vines that grow wild around his community. Taught by his father, who learned from the elders before him, Dakias brews certain plants into teas [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In the forested highlands of Mindanao Island in the southern Philippines, Mingay Dakias knows exactly where to find medicine — not in modern health clinics but in the leaves, roots and vines that grow wild around his community. Taught by his father, who learned from the elders before him, Dakias brews certain plants into teas to treat stomachaches and mixes others with coconut oil to treat wounds and rashes. “For many common illnesses, these traditional remedies are really our first aid,” said 65-year-old Dakias, a member of the Manobo-Dulangan Indigenous community in Sultan Kudarat province. “We usually rely on these treatments first and only go to the clinic or hospital when an illness becomes very serious.” Dakias lives hours from the nearest paved road — much farther from a hospital. Like many Indigenous communities across the Philippines, the Manobo-Dulangan rely on forest medicine for everyday health care. This includes alingatong (stinging nettle, Dendrocnide meyeniana), a deciduous shrub whose broad, hairy leaves conceal a sting, yet locals mix it with coconut oil to create an ointment for easing muscle and joint pain, urinary problems and skin conditions such as eczema. But researchers say this knowledge system is increasingly at risk, not only from threats like deforestation but also from limited government efforts to formally document, support and integrate traditional medicine into national health and conservation programs. Locals mix alingatong (stinging nettle) with coconut oil to create an ointment for easing muscle and joint pain, urinary problems and skin conditions such as&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/08/filipino-communities-use-vast-variety-of-endemic-plants-for-health-study/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/08/filipino-communities-use-vast-variety-of-endemic-plants-for-health-study/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-304095</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Reshu Bashyal becomes fourth Nepali in as many years to win Whitley Award</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/05/botanist-reshu-bashyal-becomes-fourth-nepali-in-as-many-years-to-win-whitley-award/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/05/botanist-reshu-bashyal-becomes-fourth-nepali-in-as-many-years-to-win-whitley-award/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>01 May 2025 00:50:01 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Abhaya Raj Joshi]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Abhaya Raj Joshi]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/05/01004758/2025_Whitley_Fund_For_Nature-16-2-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=298398</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Nepal, and South Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Botany, Conservation, Environmental Heroes, Medicinal Plants, Orchids, and Plants]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[KATHMANDU — Nepali conservationist Reshu Bashyal has been named one of the six recipients of this year’s prestigious Whitley Award in recognition of her work to tackle widespread poaching of orchids and yews. Bashyal is the fourth Nepali in as many years to win the award, dubbed the “Green Oscars,” for which she will receive [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[KATHMANDU — Nepali conservationist Reshu Bashyal has been named one of the six recipients of this year’s prestigious Whitley Award in recognition of her work to tackle widespread poaching of orchids and yews. Bashyal is the fourth Nepali in as many years to win the award, dubbed the “Green Oscars,” for which she will receive 50,000 pounds (nearly $67,000) from the U.K.’s Princess Anne, patron of the Whitley Fund for Nature. The award ceremony was held on April 30 in London. “Orchids and yews are very special because they stand out as evolutionarily distinct plants that have lured people not just because of their beauty but also with their medicinal values,” said Bashyal, research and program lead at the Kathmandu-based NGO Greenhood Nepal. The Whitley Fund for Nature said the award recognizes Bashyal’s pioneering work in understanding the extent of commercial harvesting of yews and orchids in Nepal by carrying out baseline research on harvesters’ motivation and techniques. Orchids, members of the plant family Orchidaceae, are known for their colorful and fragrant blooms, and Nepal is believed to be home to around 500 of the roughly 30,000 species known to science. Also referred to as the “tigers of the plant world,” orchids have long been subjected to unsustainable harvesting and international trade, both for ornamental purposes and for use in Ayurvedic and traditional Chinese medicine. Another Nepal-native species, Maire&#8217;s yew (Taxus mairei), is also sought out for use in medicine; a compound derived from the plant’s shoots is used to&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/05/botanist-reshu-bashyal-becomes-fourth-nepali-in-as-many-years-to-win-whitley-award/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/05/botanist-reshu-bashyal-becomes-fourth-nepali-in-as-many-years-to-win-whitley-award/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-298398</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>In a Noah’s Ark move, PNG migrants bring thousands of trees to safer ground</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/11/in-a-noahs-ark-move-png-climate-migrants-bring-thousands-of-trees-to-safer-ground/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/11/in-a-noahs-ark-move-png-climate-migrants-bring-thousands-of-trees-to-safer-ground/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>21 Nov 2024 17:25:18 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Thibault Le Pivain]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Latoya Abulu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2024/11/21170737/Carterets-outrigger-e1732209528515-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=290430</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Pacific Ocean, Papua, Papua New Guinea, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Adaptation, Adaptation To Climate Change, Biodiversity, Climate Change, Conservation, Erosion, Human Migration, Medicinal Plants, Migration, Plants, Sea Levels, Traditional Medicine, Trees, and Water]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[BOUGAINVILLE, Papua New Guinea — The climate is changing, science shows. And according to some estimates, it could create anywhere between 200 million and 1.2 billion climate refugees by 2050. As people flee floods, failed harvests, dried rivers or destroyed homes, what becomes of the ecosystems they leave behind? Of the wildlife, trees and endemic [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[BOUGAINVILLE, Papua New Guinea — The climate is changing, science shows. And according to some estimates, it could create anywhere between 200 million and 1.2 billion climate refugees by 2050. As people flee floods, failed harvests, dried rivers or destroyed homes, what becomes of the ecosystems they leave behind? Of the wildlife, trees and endemic species? In the southwestern Pacific, people are bringing much of this biodiversity along with them. The residents of the Carteret Islands in Papua New Guinea are responding to climate threats by moving not only themselves to safer ground — but also the plants and trees that sustain their way of life. In their move, they have transplanted hundreds of specimens, representing dozens of species, across a small stretch of ocean. “We’re not just leaving. We’re trying to bring a part of our islands with us,” says Maria Kamin, who left the Carteret Islands to relocate with other families in response to rising sea levels. They’ve moved to Bougainville, another island part of the country. In their new home, this vegetation, combined with local flora, have helped establish a thriving forest of 175,000 trees and plants. During this “green migration,” residents tell Mongabay they hope to preserve not only the biodiversity of their native islands as conditions worsen, but also their culture and sense of place. Maria Kamin walks in the forest in Bougainville which villagers planted using tree species brought over from the Carteret Island. Image by Thibault Le Pivain. Carrying home forward Few people&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2024/11/in-a-noahs-ark-move-png-climate-migrants-bring-thousands-of-trees-to-safer-ground/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/11/in-a-noahs-ark-move-png-climate-migrants-bring-thousands-of-trees-to-safer-ground/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-290430</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>The Panamanian shamans working to save their ancestral medicinal plants</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/10/the-panamanian-shamans-working-to-save-their-ancestral-medicinal-plants/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/10/the-panamanian-shamans-working-to-save-their-ancestral-medicinal-plants/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>22 Oct 2024 06:00:21 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Adam D. Williams]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Latoya Abulu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2024/10/18103636/Santa-Martas-3-shamans-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=288979</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Conservation and Religion]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Central America, Latin America, and Panama]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Conservation, Culture, Environment, Health, Indigenous Peoples, Medicinal Plants, Medicine, Plants, Rainforests, Religions, Traditional Knowledge, Traditional Medicine, and Traditional People]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[SANTA MARTA, Panama — Mauricio Martínez was convinced he was going to die. The year was 2021 and Martínez, gravely ill with COVID-19, struggled to breathe, walk and swallow food. As his condition deteriorated, he decided that instead of being intubated in a hospital in the nation’s capital of Panama City, he’d prefer to pass [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[SANTA MARTA, Panama — Mauricio Martínez was convinced he was going to die. The year was 2021 and Martínez, gravely ill with COVID-19, struggled to breathe, walk and swallow food. As his condition deteriorated, he decided that instead of being intubated in a hospital in the nation’s capital of Panama City, he’d prefer to pass away at home among his family and friends in the small Ngäbe-Buglé Indigenous village of Santa Marta. “I spent all the money I had left to get a private car to drive me nine hours from Panama City so that my family could see me alive one last time,” says Martínez, a tall man with thick black hair and a thin, trimmed beard. Martínez says that when he arrived in Santa Marta, his father, Mauricio Sr., a town shaman, gave him doses of traditional medicinal plants in the form of teas and liquid drops. Over the course of a few days, Martínez says his health stabilized, his breathing returned and he regained his ability to walk. “Thanks to traditional medicine, I survived,” the 44-year-old says. “I know I wouldn’t be here without it.” In Santa Marta, traditional medicine plants, remedies and rituals are sacred. In green jungled plots of land in the hills that overlook the tiny town of 500 residents near Panama’s Caribbean coast, local shamans have for generations used the area’s tropical vegetation, leaves, branches and stems to cure residents’ ailments and illnesses. There is a growing fear in Santa Marta, however, that&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2024/10/the-panamanian-shamans-working-to-save-their-ancestral-medicinal-plants/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-288979</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Indigenous knowledge proves key in a study of plants gorillas use to self-medicate</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/10/indigenous-knowledge-proves-key-in-a-study-of-plants-gorillas-use-to-self-medicate/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/10/indigenous-knowledge-proves-key-in-a-study-of-plants-gorillas-use-to-self-medicate/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>03 Oct 2024 21:15:17 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Charles Mpaka]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Isabel Esterman]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2024/10/12204129/gabon-15610-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=288187</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Great Apes]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Africa, Central Africa, and Gabon]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Apes, Biodiversity, Conservation, Environment, Gorillas, Indigenous Peoples, Mammals, Medicinal Plants, Medicine, Primates, Protected Areas, Rainforests, Traditional Knowledge, Traditional Medicine, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[For the Indigenous Vungu people living along the border of Gabon’s Moukalaba-Doudou National Park, the forest here has long been a source of traditional medicines. So when researchers set out to determine the bioactive properties of plants consumed by the park’s western lowland gorillas (Gorilla gorilla gorilla), and which the Vungu also use for medicine, [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[For the Indigenous Vungu people living along the border of Gabon’s Moukalaba-Doudou National Park, the forest here has long been a source of traditional medicines. So when researchers set out to determine the bioactive properties of plants consumed by the park’s western lowland gorillas (Gorilla gorilla gorilla), and which the Vungu also use for medicine, the community’s knowledge proved vital to their findings. Leresche Oyaba Yinda, lead author of the resulting study published in PLOS ONE, says interviewing the local people, traditional healers and herbalists about the medicinal uses of plants eaten by gorillas “was a decisive step in the effectiveness of our study.” “Indeed, these ethnobotanical and ethnopharmacological surveys carried out among the [Indigenous people] of Moukalaba-Doudou National Park were like a compass pointing us in the direction of our questioning,” says Yinda, a scientist from the bacteriology lab at the Interdisciplinary Medical Research Center of Franceville in Gabon. A growing body of research has established that nonhuman animals use plants, as well as animal or soil substances, to treat wounds or other health conditions. It’s also been found that some of the plants that animals consume for self-medication are also used medicinally by humans. In the current study, a team of 13 researchers aimed to determine the medical properties of plants consumed by gorillas that are also part of the Vungu people’s traditional pharmacopeia. Lowland gorilla in Gabon. Western lowland gorillas eat a wide variety of plants, including species used medicinally by local people. Image by Rhett A.&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2024/10/indigenous-knowledge-proves-key-in-a-study-of-plants-gorillas-use-to-self-medicate/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-288187</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>The Amazon is ablaze again. What it means for us (commentary)</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/09/the-amazon-is-ablaze-again-what-it-means-for-us-commentary/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/09/the-amazon-is-ablaze-again-what-it-means-for-us-commentary/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>30 Sep 2024 00:08:30 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Mark J. Plotkin]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rhett Butler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2024/09/27150306/amazon_201359_24-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=287959</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Amazon, Brazil, Latin America, South America, and Suriname]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Agriculture, Botany, Climate Change, Commentary, Conservation, Deforestation, Ecosystem Services, Environment, Fires, Forests, Green, Impact Of Climate Change, Indigenous Peoples, Medicinal Plants, Precipitation, Rainforests, Threats To Rainforests, Traditional People, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In 2019, the world watched in horror as images of the Amazon rainforest ablaze flooded the news. Over 70,000 wildfires raged uncontrollably, killing wildlife, filling hospitals with patients struggling to breathe, polluting rivers, halting air traffic, and casting a dark pall over Brazil’s largest cities. And now, it&#8217;s happening again. Climate change is no longer [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In 2019, the world watched in horror as images of the Amazon rainforest ablaze flooded the news. Over 70,000 wildfires raged uncontrollably, killing wildlife, filling hospitals with patients struggling to breathe, polluting rivers, halting air traffic, and casting a dark pall over Brazil’s largest cities. And now, it&#8217;s happening again. Scorched earth on the banks of the drought-stricken Xingu River in the Capoto-Jarina Indigenous Territory on September 12th, 2024. Photo © Marizilda Cruppe / Greenpeace. Fire on the banks of the drought-stricken Xingu River in the Capoto-Jarina Indigenous Territory on September 12th, 2024. Photo © Marizilda Cruppe / Greenpeace. Climate change is no longer a distant threat; it’s here, growing more severe with each year. We are witnessing an increase in extreme weather events—more frequent and intense hurricanes, floods, and droughts. Rising sea levels are flooding coastlines, endangering entire island nations as well as major American cities like New York and my hometown of New Orleans. Worsening heatwaves are threatening to make vast regions of the Middle East and Indian subcontinent uninhabitable. Climate refugees and drought can only lead to more human misery and additional conflict. Number of fire hotspots detected by the Aqua satellite across Brazilian biomes between Jan 1 and Sep 26, 1998-2024, according to INPE. Number of fire hotspots detected by the Aqua satellite across the Brazilian Amazon (Amazonia) between Jan 1 and Sep 26, 1998-2024, according to INPE. Ironically, some of South America’s most traditional peoples were among the first to raise the alarm about global&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2024/09/the-amazon-is-ablaze-again-what-it-means-for-us-commentary/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-287959</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Sumatra community school hands down ancient knowledge to modern generation</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/08/sumatra-community-school-hands-down-ancient-knowledge-to-modern-generation/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/08/sumatra-community-school-hands-down-ancient-knowledge-to-modern-generation/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>07 Aug 2024 11:59:40 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Teguh Suprayitno]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Philip Jacobson]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2024/08/07065415/guess-the-type-of-medicinal-plant-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=285808</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Indigenous Peoples and Conservation]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Indonesia, Jambi, Southeast Asia, and Sumatra]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Community-based Conservation, Conservation, Culture, Education, Environment, History, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, Medicinal Plants, Natural Resources, Plants, Traditional Knowledge, and Traditional People]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[MUARO JAMBI, Indonesia — Mbok Hawo picked a clutch of galangal, lemongrass and turmeric as the gaggle of schoolkids assembled by an array of potted plants, arranged in Hawo’s garden like bottles in a medicine cabinet. “Turmeric isn’t only for flavoring cooking,” the 64-year-old healer explained to the children. “It can also be a medicine [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[MUARO JAMBI, Indonesia — Mbok Hawo picked a clutch of galangal, lemongrass and turmeric as the gaggle of schoolkids assembled by an array of potted plants, arranged in Hawo’s garden like bottles in a medicine cabinet. “Turmeric isn’t only for flavoring cooking,” the 64-year-old healer explained to the children. “It can also be a medicine for the stomach.” Generations of Indigenous healers like Hawo have drawn on the forest floor to treat minor ailments and ward off more serious health conditions. However, here in Muaro Jambi district on the Indonesian island of Sumatra, many parents worry about the loss of know-how to spot medicinal plants, as modern distractions compete for children’s attention spans. More than two decades ago, a group of Muaro Jambi residents formed Rumah Menapo, a civil society group dedicated to preserving local culture. Ever since, members of Rumah Menapo like Mukhtar Hadi, the founder, have worked to enable their ancient history to live side by side with contemporary Islamic culture. Mukhtar and members of the Rumah Menapo community understood more than a decade ago the risks that young people wouldn’t learn about the local history and culture. “I don&#8217;t want them to forget or not know about the history of the place where they were born and raised,” Mukhtar told Mongabay Indonesia. In 2010, Mukhtar helped found the Sekolah Alam, or Nature School, a voluntary initiative staffed by Indigenous elders like Hawo. The school’s teachers help young people identify herbal tonics, and apply the range of senses&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2024/08/sumatra-community-school-hands-down-ancient-knowledge-to-modern-generation/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/08/sumatra-community-school-hands-down-ancient-knowledge-to-modern-generation/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-285808</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Indigenous midwives in Panama strive to preserve traditional medicine for maternal health</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/07/indigenous-midwives-in-panama-strive-to-preserve-traditional-medicine-for-maternal-health/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/07/indigenous-midwives-in-panama-strive-to-preserve-traditional-medicine-for-maternal-health/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>25 Jul 2024 20:09:16 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Adam D. Williams]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Latoya Abulu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2024/07/25164322/ASASTRAN-women-leaders-Florinda-Zurdo-Silvia-Salina-Patricia-Mendoza-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=285047</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Indigenous Peoples and Conservation]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Central America, Latin America, and Panama]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Conservation, Culture, Environment, Health, Indigenous Peoples, Medicinal Plants, Medicine, Plants, Rainforests, Traditional Knowledge, Traditional Medicine, Traditional People, and Women In Science]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[KUERIMA, Panama — Once you’re within the Ngäbe-Buglé Indigenous territory in western Panama, the vegetation of the rainforest grows thick and signs of industrial development are scarce. Dirt roads wind up muddy jungled hills to wooden homes with palm-thatched roofs, and the women of the group can be seen carrying babies on their backs in [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[KUERIMA, Panama — Once you’re within the Ngäbe-Buglé Indigenous territory in western Panama, the vegetation of the rainforest grows thick and signs of industrial development are scarce. Dirt roads wind up muddy jungled hills to wooden homes with palm-thatched roofs, and the women of the group can be seen carrying babies on their backs in straw bags made of vegetable fibers called chácaras or krä. Unknown to many outsiders visiting this scene of lush green life, they’re also surrounded by medicine for pregnant women. The culture of Ngäbe-Buglé is ancient and enduring, and the group has maintained its traditions for generations. Birthing rituals among the Ngäbe-Buglé are particularly sacred, and for centuries women have used traditional medicines — from trees, herbs, roots and leaves endemic to the region — to ease pains and assist with complications during pregnancy and childbirth. Often administered by a midwife or traditional medicine doctor, expectant mothers receive multiple natural remedies, usually consumed in the form of teas or liquids, that represent a fundamental custom of the group’s culture. However, there’s a growing concern within the group that the availability and knowledge of the curative properties of the plants used in childbirth will soon be lost. Deforestation, large-scale crop harvests, climate change and the increasing influence of Western medicine are altering the 7,000-square-kilometer (2,700-square-mile) landscape of the Ngäbe-Buglé territory and threatening long-standing traditions. It’s for this reason that an organization of midwives and traditional medicine doctors, known as the Ngäbe Association of Agents of Traditional and&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2024/07/indigenous-midwives-in-panama-strive-to-preserve-traditional-medicine-for-maternal-health/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-285047</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Sick chimps seek out medicinal plants to heal themselves, study finds</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/06/sick-chimps-seek-out-medicinal-plants-to-heal-themselves-study-finds/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/06/sick-chimps-seek-out-medicinal-plants-to-heal-themselves-study-finds/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>20 Jun 2024 18:05:12 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Charles Mpaka]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Isabel Esterman]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2024/06/20175324/IMG_0632-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=283489</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Africa, East Africa, and Uganda]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animal Behavior, Animals, Apes, Biodiversity, Chimpanzees, Conservation, Environment, Great Apes, Mammals, Medicinal Plants, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Wild chimpanzees actively seek out plants with medicinal properties to treat themselves for specific ailments,a new study has found. While most animals consume foods with medicinal properties as part of their routine diet, few species have been shown to engage in self-medication in a way that suggests they have basic awareness of the healing properties [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Wild chimpanzees actively seek out plants with medicinal properties to treat themselves for specific ailments,a new study has found. While most animals consume foods with medicinal properties as part of their routine diet, few species have been shown to engage in self-medication in a way that suggests they have basic awareness of the healing properties of the plants they’re feeding on. Until now, the challenge has been to distinguish between normal consumption of food that has medicinal value, on the one hand, and ingesting such foods for the purpose of treating a condition, on the other. “Self-medication has been studied for years, but it has been historically difficult to push the field forward, as the burden of proof is very high when attempting to prove that a resource is used as a medicine,” Elodie Freymann, a scientist at the University of Oxford in the U.K. and lead author of the study, told Mongabay in an email. To deal with the challenge, the study adopted a multidisciplinary approach, combining behavioral data, health monitoring, and pharmacological testing of a variety of plant materials chimpanzees feed on. It pooled together 13 researchers comprising primatologists, ethnopharmacologists, parasitologists, ecologists and botanists. A chimpanzee in Uganda&#8217;s Budongo Forest, which is home to roughly 600-700 chimpanzees, including three groups habituated to humans. Image by Maciej via Flickr (CC BY-SA 2.0). According to the study, pharmacological data interpreted on its own is important for establishing the presence of medicinal resources in chimpanzee diets. However, this study also relied&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2024/06/sick-chimps-seek-out-medicinal-plants-to-heal-themselves-study-finds/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/06/sick-chimps-seek-out-medicinal-plants-to-heal-themselves-study-finds/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-283489</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Traditional healers in Philippines keep their ‘forest pharmacy’ standing</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/02/traditional-healers-in-philippines-keep-their-forest-pharmacy-standing/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/02/traditional-healers-in-philippines-keep-their-forest-pharmacy-standing/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>09 Feb 2024 17:56:39 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Keith Anthony Fabro]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Isabel Esterman]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2024/02/09112950/3-Juanita-Torremocha-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=278678</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Indigenous Peoples and Conservation]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Philippines, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Community Development, Community Forests, Community-based Conservation, Conservation, Culture, Environment, Forests, Indigenous Peoples, Medicinal Plants, Medicine, Protected Areas, Reforestation, Traditional Knowledge, Traditional Medicine, Traditional People, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[CANTABON, Philippines — In the heart of Siquijor province in the southern Philippines lies the secluded mountain village of Cantabon. Amid the verdant trees, the healing hut, or balay pahi-uli, of shamans Noel and Juanita Torremocha stands as a serene sanctuary, offering solace to patients seeking traditional folk remedies. Siquijor is famed for its thriving [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[CANTABON, Philippines — In the heart of Siquijor province in the southern Philippines lies the secluded mountain village of Cantabon. Amid the verdant trees, the healing hut, or balay pahi-uli, of shamans Noel and Juanita Torremocha stands as a serene sanctuary, offering solace to patients seeking traditional folk remedies. Siquijor is famed for its thriving traditional healing practices that draw a diverse crowd, including international visitors, seeking remedies for a wide array of health concerns ranging from simple sprains to severe ailments like cancer. The Torremochas are part of a community of 300 mananambal, or healers, who have kept this heritage alive for generations. On a sunny morning in December 2023, the couple attend to an elderly woman who’s come from a nearby island province complaining of arm pain. The woman removes her shoes at the hut’s lanai, where a rack of amulets and potions are on display. Juanita, 64, gently guides her into the treatment room, enclosed by walls of woven bamboo strips. Inside, Noel, 54, has the patient sit on a wooden stool. An altar adorned with miniature statues of prominent Catholic figures stands behind him, attesting to the Philippines&#8217; standing as the largest Catholic country in Asia. As he listens to the woman recount the origins of her ailment, Noel’s right hand rests atop a wooden table laden with large bottles filled to the brim with concoctions of oil and extracts of medicinal plants. Inside his healing hut near Mount Bandilaan National Park, healer Noel Torremocha listens&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2024/02/traditional-healers-in-philippines-keep-their-forest-pharmacy-standing/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-278678</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Ghana’s medicinal plants, the ‘first aid’ for communities, are under threat</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/02/ghanas-medicinal-plants-the-first-aid-for-communities-are-under-threat/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/02/ghanas-medicinal-plants-the-first-aid-for-communities-are-under-threat/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>02 Feb 2024 16:24:18 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Sonam Lama Hyolmo]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Latoya Abulu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2024/02/02152834/neem-flowers-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=278486</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Africa, Ghana, and West Africa]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Botany, Community Forests, Conservation, Environment, Indigenous Peoples, Medicinal Plants, Natural Resources, Plants, Traditional Knowledge, Traditional Medicine, Traditional People, and Trees]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Rural communities in southwestern Ghana lacking access to conventional medicine are using dozens of medicinal tree species to treat up to 83 ailments, according to a new study. However, many of these tree species are also threatened by factors including overharvesting and agricultural expansion that drives deforestation in the area, the study authors say. The [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Rural communities in southwestern Ghana lacking access to conventional medicine are using dozens of medicinal tree species to treat up to 83 ailments, according to a new study. However, many of these tree species are also threatened by factors including overharvesting and agricultural expansion that drives deforestation in the area, the study authors say. The study, published in the journal Heliyon, found that the communities on the fringes of the Asukese Forest Reserve and Amama Shelterbelt Forest Reserve use 70 species of medicinal trees from 33 taxonomic families. The top five pharmacological effects they attribute to these trees are anti-inflammatory, anti-malarial, anti-microbial, anti-bacterial, and reproductive boosting properties. “Herbal medicine is like the ‘first aid’ of rural communities and the only aid in some remote areas,” study co-author Michael Asigbaase, a lecturer in the Department of Forest Sciences at Ghana’s University of Energy and Natural Resources. “There are herbalists in all communities. In fact, in some cases, they have been able to help people who could not find help via clinics and hospitals.” The study authors interviewed 88 respondents from four communities, including the Indigenous Akan-Bono people and northern tribes like the Kusaasi and Waala to understand their use of medicinal trees in the region. The findings were evaluated using five parameters, including an Indigenous knowledge index that assessed community knowledge of plant properties, healing effects, varieties and side effects. The rest of the parameters looked at how often medicinal properties were cited in scientific literature, the species and plants’ part&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2024/02/ghanas-medicinal-plants-the-first-aid-for-communities-are-under-threat/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-278486</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Bangladeshi farmers eye moringa as a climate and economic solution</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/01/bangladeshi-farmers-eye-moringa-as-a-climate-and-economic-solution/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/01/bangladeshi-farmers-eye-moringa-as-a-climate-and-economic-solution/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>22 Jan 2024 13:41:51 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Abu Siddique]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Abu Siddique]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Food systems]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2024/01/22131513/Bangladesh-moringa-1-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=277886</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Bangladesh, and South Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Adaptation To Climate Change, Agriculture, Agroecology, Biodiversity, Climate Change, Environment, Farming, Food, food security, Happy-upbeat Environmental, Health, Impact Of Climate Change, Medicinal Plants, Nature-based climate solutions, Plants, Solutions, Traditional Knowledge, and Trees]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In Bangladesh, farmers are increasingly tapping into a growing global market for moringa, a tree prized for its nutritional value and potential as a climate solution. The fast-growing, drought-resistant moringa (Moringa oleifera) tree is indigenous to South Asian nations such as India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan and widely cultivated in tropical and subtropical countries. As [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In Bangladesh, farmers are increasingly tapping into a growing global market for moringa, a tree prized for its nutritional value and potential as a climate solution. The fast-growing, drought-resistant moringa (Moringa oleifera) tree is indigenous to South Asian nations such as India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan and widely cultivated in tropical and subtropical countries. As both the leaves and the fruits of the moringa tree are rich in nutrients, with so many minerals combining to provide both immunity-boosting and life-sustaining nutrients, researchers refer to moringa leaves as highly beneficial to the human body. A Bangladeshi entrepreneur has been working to create a social movement and entrepreneurship in moringa cultivation and marketing since 2017 and has set up producer groups for community farming, contract farming and homestead cultivation of moringa in 20 districts of Bangladesh. In Bangladesh, farmers are increasingly tapping into a growing global market for moringa, a tree prized for its nutritional value and potential as a climate solution. Image courtesy of GT Moringa. “I have been trying to make people understand the importance of moringa cultivation and its economic and health benefits since 2004. Since in 2017, I have engaged myself specifically on Moringa and product development by using different parts of the plant, and finally in 2022, I formed a company named GT Moringa Ltd. with the support of investors,” said Rajib Parvez Raju, the chief executive of GT Moringa Ltd. About 5,000 farmers in 20 districts from different parts of the country have planted moringa plants,&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2024/01/bangladeshi-farmers-eye-moringa-as-a-climate-and-economic-solution/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-277886</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>‘Immense body of knowledge’ at stake in Cambodia’s Prey Lang as deforestation soars</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/12/immense-body-of-knowledge-at-stake-in-cambodias-prey-lang-as-deforestation-soars/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/12/immense-body-of-knowledge-at-stake-in-cambodias-prey-lang-as-deforestation-soars/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>13 Dec 2023 03:34:15 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Gerald Flynn]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Isabel Esterman]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[global forests]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2023/12/13023613/Banner-image-resized-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=276664</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Indigenous Peoples and Conservation]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Cambodia, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Botany, Community Forests, Conservation, Corporate Environmental Transgressors, Critically Endangered Species, Culture, Deforestation, Ecosystems, Education, Endangered Species, Environment, forest degradation, Forest Destruction, Forest Loss, Forests, Global Environmental Crisis, Illegal Logging, Illegal Mining, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, Land Conflict, Medicinal Plants, Medicine, Mining, Plants, Rainforests, Research, Saving Species From Extinction, Solutions, Species, Threats To Rainforests, Traditional People, Trees, and Tropical Deforestation]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[PHNOM PENH — “This book won’t stop deforestation, but it can show what’s at stake, what we will lose if we lose Prey Lang,” said Nerea Turreira-Garcia, assistant professor at the University of Copenhagen, at the Nov. 14 launch of Gifts from Nature, a book she co-authored with Dimitris Argyriou, community engagement and technology specialist [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[PHNOM PENH — “This book won’t stop deforestation, but it can show what’s at stake, what we will lose if we lose Prey Lang,” said Nerea Turreira-Garcia, assistant professor at the University of Copenhagen, at the Nov. 14 launch of Gifts from Nature, a book she co-authored with Dimitris Argyriou, community engagement and technology specialist at Forest &amp; Peoples Organization. The book documents the wide range of flora found in Cambodia’s Prey Lang Wildlife Sanctuary and a multitude of uses that communities who live in and around the forest have found for them. Five years of fieldwork and 374 plant species later, what began in 2014 finally blossomed into fruition in 2023 at the Preak Leap National Institute of Agriculture. Gifts from Nature aims to make accessible in both Khmer and English the findings from Indigenous-led research into the embattled Prey Lang, mainland Southeast Asia’s largest lowland evergreen rainforest. “Lowland forests, such as Prey Lang, are at higher risk of deforestation than mountain forests as they are more accessible to loggers and their trucks,” Turreira-Garcia said. “The importance of Prey Lang lies in its great diversity of forest types and plant species, many of which are endemic to the central plains of Cambodia, meaning they can be found nowhere else, rendering Prey Lang a critical ecosystem.” This ecosystem in particular has been the target of illegal loggers for years. Nearly 90,000 hectares (222,000 acres) of forest were lost between 2002 and 2022, according to Global Forest Watch data, with more&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2023/12/immense-body-of-knowledge-at-stake-in-cambodias-prey-lang-as-deforestation-soars/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-276664</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Traditional healers push for recognition and licensing of age-old Himalayan practice</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/12/traditional-healers-push-for-recognition-and-licensing-of-age-old-himalayan-practice/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/12/traditional-healers-push-for-recognition-and-licensing-of-age-old-himalayan-practice/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>05 Dec 2023 16:23:51 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Sonam Lama Hyolmo]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Latoya Abulu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2023/12/05155131/16004709352_8d98d2de17_k-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=276291</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Indigenous Peoples and Conservation]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Nepal, and South Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Botany, Community-based Conservation, Conservation, Culture, Endangered Species, Environment, Fungi, Indigenous Peoples, Medicinal Plants, Medicine, Plants, Religions, Research, Traditional Knowledge, Traditional Medicine, and Traditional People]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[KATHMANDU — In the isolated kingdom of Lo Manthang, tucked away in Nepal’s Himalayas, ancient structures stand tall on arid lands that only allowed tourists in from the late 1990s. Amid a small settlement of Loba Buddhists whose children have now migrated out, 65-year-old Gyatso Bista is trying preserve the ancient Tibetan medicinal system of [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[KATHMANDU — In the isolated kingdom of Lo Manthang, tucked away in Nepal’s Himalayas, ancient structures stand tall on arid lands that only allowed tourists in from the late 1990s. Amid a small settlement of Loba Buddhists whose children have now migrated out, 65-year-old Gyatso Bista is trying preserve the ancient Tibetan medicinal system of Sowa Rigpa, also known as the science of healing. This traditional knowledge and practice, relying on both scholarly and religious texts, has been used in highland Asian communities for more than 2,500 years. Throughout the millennia, healers gathered, observed and tested a vast array of local endemic species, varieties of plants, fungi and lichens and dozens of minerals, working them into formulas with the hope, and satisfaction, that they could treat certain physical and mental illnesses. The right quantity of herb ingredients is the key to the medicinal formula, Bista says. Myrobalan (Terminalia chebula), baheda (Terminalia bellirica) and amala (Phyllanthus emblica), which all have a sour taste, are considered the king of herbs and are common ingredients used among hundreds. Plant and pharmacognosy studies also attest to their healing, therapeutic and cardioprotective benefits, as well as the herbal properties of other plants, fungi and minerals that healers have documented in their pharmaceutical system. “Healers are trained to not only recognize herb potency and healing benefits but also to put together the required quantity of ingredients to develop a medicine,” Bista says. Although this knowledge dates back to before the first millenium, it is gradually disappearing&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2023/12/traditional-healers-push-for-recognition-and-licensing-of-age-old-himalayan-practice/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-276291</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Bangladesh ‘Village of Herbs’ profits from planting rather than cutting trees</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/07/bangladesh-village-of-herbs-profits-from-planting-rather-than-cutting-trees/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/07/bangladesh-village-of-herbs-profits-from-planting-rather-than-cutting-trees/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>21 Jul 2023 12:19:20 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Mohammad Al-Masum Molla]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Abu Siddique]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[agroecology]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2023/07/21114550/Shimul-or-Red-silk-cotton-1-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=271237</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Bangladesh, and South Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Agriculture, Agroecology, Biodiversity, Conservation, Environment, Farming, Forestry, Happy-upbeat Environmental, Medicinal Plants, Medicine, Plants, Traditional Knowledge, Traditional Medicine, and Trees]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Back in the mid-1990s, before the era of internet, mobile phones and satellite televisions, the government-run terrestrial broadcaster Bangladesh Television (BTV) was the only source of visual entertainment for the people of this country. In those days, the government ran social awareness videos on issues such as the importance of not cutting down trees, oral [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
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							<![CDATA[Back in the mid-1990s, before the era of internet, mobile phones and satellite televisions, the government-run terrestrial broadcaster Bangladesh Television (BTV) was the only source of visual entertainment for the people of this country. In those days, the government ran social awareness videos on issues such as the importance of not cutting down trees, oral saline for the treatment of diarrhea, preserving baby hilsa fish and so on. Some of these advertisements were not only hugely popular but also had a lasting impression in the memories of people who grew up in that decade. Among those advertisements, there was one that poignantly portrayed the importance of trees in our lives in general and as a source of herbal medicine in particular. Legendary actor Abul Khair, who died in 2001 at the age of 71, played the character of a kabiraj in that advertisement. A kabiraj is an herbal medicine practitioner found in Bangladeshi villages who makes his own medicine using Indigenous knowledge of herbal plants, human anatomy and diseases. In that video, pointing to the rampant cutting of trees everywhere, he regretted that the plants he had used to make medicine were not there anymore. A nursery growing herbal medicinal plants. Image by Bulbul Ahmed. Interestingly, even in this era of rampant development in medical science, technology and economy, when traditional ways of life give way to newer ways, these local village doctors can still be found in plenty. Thanks to a renewed zeal and understanding of herbal medicine among&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2023/07/bangladesh-village-of-herbs-profits-from-planting-rather-than-cutting-trees/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-271237</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Deforestation in Borneo threatens three endangered, endemic plant species</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/04/deforestation-in-borneo-threatens-three-endangered-endemic-plant-species/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/04/deforestation-in-borneo-threatens-three-endangered-endemic-plant-species/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>21 Apr 2023 04:00:54 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Basten Gokkon]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Basten Gokkon]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2020/07/07101725/kalbar_drone_190749-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=267663</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Brunei, Indonesia, Kalimantan, Malaysia, Southeast Asia, and West Kalimantan]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Conservation, Critically Endangered Species, Deforestation, Environment, Forests, Habitat Degradation, Habitat Loss, Logging, Medicinal Plants, Mining, Plantations, Plants, Rainforests, Selective Logging, Trees, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[JAKARTA — The rampant deforestation for monoculture plantation and logging in western Indonesian Borneo has exacerbated the extinction risks of three plant species endemic to the island’s riparian lowland rainforests, a new study said. A group of Indonesian researchers has reported that three Bornean plant species, Vatica rynchocarpa, V. havilandii and V. cauliflora, found in [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[JAKARTA — The rampant deforestation for monoculture plantation and logging in western Indonesian Borneo has exacerbated the extinction risks of three plant species endemic to the island’s riparian lowland rainforests, a new study said. A group of Indonesian researchers has reported that three Bornean plant species, Vatica rynchocarpa, V. havilandii and V. cauliflora, found in the lowland forest fragments along the upper Kapuas River in West Kalimantan province, were threatened by small-holder farming, industrial agriculture and timber extraction. These patches of riparian forests were unprotected, as they have been designated as “other-use” or APL, rendering them available for any development and most likely to see further deforestation, added the authors in their report published in the April issue of Journal for Nature Conservation. “I don’t think that this is first research on plant species in Borneo, but ours is the first population study on the three species which are threatened with extinction and one of them is very endemic, in their natural habitat,” Enggal Primananda, a forest researcher at Indonesia’s National Research and Innovation Agency (BRIN) who is the lead author of the paper, told Mongabay in an interview. Indonesia&#8217;s West Kalimantan province on the island of Borneo. Muara Sungai Landak is operating near the coast, not far from the provincial capital Pontianak. Image by TUBS via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0). Former lowland rainforest replaced with a monoculture plantation in West Kalimantan, Indonesia. Image courtesy of Rhett Butler/Mongabay. Enggal said the population assessment of the three Vatica species from&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2023/04/deforestation-in-borneo-threatens-three-endangered-endemic-plant-species/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-267663</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>&#8216;War with weeds&#8217; lacks ecological understanding and empathy (commentary)</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/02/war-with-weeds-lacks-ecological-understanding-and-empathy-commentary/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2023/02/war-with-weeds-lacks-ecological-understanding-and-empathy-commentary/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>01 Feb 2023 22:19:26 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Nimal Chandrasena]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Erik Hoffner]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2023/02/01211812/1440px-Centella_asiatica_%E0%A6%A5%E0%A6%BE%E0%A6%A8%E0%A6%95%E0%A7%81%E0%A6%A8%E0%A6%BF_3-e1675286367741-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=265180</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Global]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Agriculture, Biodiversity, Books, Botany, Commentary, Conservation, Disasters, Environment, Invasive Species, Medicinal Plants, and Plants]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[As a group of plants, weeds are unloved by some people. However, this dislike is not universal. Weeds are colonizing, pioneering plants, with special botanical and ecological attributes that allow them to succeed in ‘disturbed’ habitats. Weedy species are a critical component of Mother Earth’s rich biodiversity. As frugal, thrifty and simple beings, which never [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[As a group of plants, weeds are unloved by some people. However, this dislike is not universal. Weeds are colonizing, pioneering plants, with special botanical and ecological attributes that allow them to succeed in ‘disturbed’ habitats. Weedy species are a critical component of Mother Earth’s rich biodiversity. As frugal, thrifty and simple beings, which never ask for too much but give back more than they take, weeds are nature’s gifts from which humans can learn many lessons. Weeds also spotlight the mistakes humans have made in managing our environmental assets by large-scale land-clearing, destruction of vegetation and soil resources, as well as unsustainable agricultural practices and urban development. In a new book on weeds, I attempt to create a &#8216;storehouse of weedy information&#8217; to enlighten general readers on the history of weeds and how to relate to them more effectively, with ecological understanding and empathy. Treating areas of Yosemite National Park with herbicides to curtail growth of Himalayan blackberry, an &#8216;aggressive invasive species&#8217; according to the National Park Service. Photo via California Invasive Plant Council. Weeds have special botanical and ecological attributes related to life cycles, growth habits, reproduction and dispersal that allow establishment in disturbed areas and their easy spread into new habitats. In exploring the history of weeds and the origins of the definitions and terminology associated with weeds, it becomes clear that all weeds are nothing but colonizing plants, which grow and thrive in disturbed habitats and environments, especially those modified by humans. But weedy species are&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2023/02/war-with-weeds-lacks-ecological-understanding-and-empathy-commentary/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-265180</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Documenting Nepal’s plant-based medical tradition: Q&#038;A with Ram Prasad Chaudhary</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2022/09/documenting-nepals-plant-based-medical-tradition-qa-with-ram-prasad-chaudhary/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2022/09/documenting-nepals-plant-based-medical-tradition-qa-with-ram-prasad-chaudhary/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>28 Sep 2022 06:34:21 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Abhaya Raj Joshi]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Latoya Abulu]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[agroecology]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2022/09/27135107/Dense_rhododendron_forests_with_background_of_Machapuchare_mountain-2-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=260717</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Nepal, and South Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Conservation, Environment, Food, Indigenous Peoples, Interviews, Interviews with conservation players, Medicinal Plants, Plants, Research, Traditional Knowledge, Traditional Medicine, and Traditional People]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[KATHMANDU — Sandwiched between China and India, Nepal is known for its geographical as well as botanical diversity. The country is not only home to the tallest mountains in the world, but also to fertile floodplains on the banks of the Ganges, and rolling hills and valleys in between. Here, too, grow flowers such as [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[KATHMANDU — Sandwiched between China and India, Nepal is known for its geographical as well as botanical diversity. The country is not only home to the tallest mountains in the world, but also to fertile floodplains on the banks of the Ganges, and rolling hills and valleys in between. Here, too, grow flowers such as the brightly colored rhododendron (Rhododendron arboreum), the national flower of Nepal, and swertia (Swertia chirayita), used to treat fevers, constipation, intestinal worms, skin diseases and liver inflammation. Local communities have for centuries lived alongside nature and made use of the plants around them for various purposes. That’s made Nepal a rich source of ethnobotanical knowledge, used to harness the medical, culinary and even ecological benefits of different plants. However, younger generations of Nepalis are shunning these age-old practices, often regarding them as superstitions, says ethnobotanist Ram Prasad Chaudhary, professor emeritus at Tribhuvan University in Kathmandu. Ram Prasad Chaudhary is an ethnobotanist who for decades has studied how various communities throughout Nepal use medicinal plants. Image courtesy of The World of Academy Sciences. Chaudhary, who began his journey into the field of ethnobotany in 1975 as a graduate student, recently spoke to Mongabay’s Abhaya Raj Joshi at his office about his experiences and how ethnobotanical knowledge can be saved for future generations. This interview was conducted in Nepali, and has been translated into English and edited for clarity. Mongabay: First, let’s talk about the history of ethnobotany in Nepal. According to your research, what led botanists&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2022/09/documenting-nepals-plant-based-medical-tradition-qa-with-ram-prasad-chaudhary/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-260717</doi>				</item>
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