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Editorial The Medicinal Plants as a
group comprise of a large number of species (about 8000) and
account for about 50% of all the higher flowering plant
species present in |
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If we examine the nature of use of medicinal plants, we shall find that about 90% of medicinal plants used by the industries are collected either from the forests or from its wild natural habitats. About 800 species are used by the industries in bulk of which about 20 species come from the commercial cultivation. More than 70% of the plants used involve destructive harvesting because usable parts are roots, bark, wood, stem or the whole plant in some cases. This causes threat to genetic biodiversity of species as well as sustainable supply of the raw drug. The need
of medicinal plants cannot be met with from forests alone,
even with their improved management. There is a great scope
for growing medicinal plants on private agriculture holdings,
which would require the supply of planting material, marketing
assistance and technical inputs at least in the initial
stages. This must come from the State Agriculture Departments
with inputs from State Forest Departments as well. Although the tree species of medicinal plants are about one third of the total medicinal plants used, research and development of this whole lot is neglected due to long gestation period required for yielding the result. Neither researchers are interested for any kind of crop improvement work which some times need their life contributions in a species, nor funding agencies are interested to support the project for about 15-20 years that is required to complete the project to infer a tangible conclusion. Public funding agencies are governed by the plan fund of five years duration and are not sure about future funding. As a result they are sceptical to fund a project of long gestation. This situations need to be overcome, if sustainability has to be addressed. Suitable
lands outside village forests, falling in the category of
permanent agricultural fallows or wastelands fit for
agriculture (e.g. canal side lands), or problem lands (e.g.
usar, ravines, etc.), may be allotted to individuals or groups
for medicinal tree cultivation in any form. In addition,
suitable incentives need to be designed and put in place to
promote medicinal tree planting on lands distributed to the
landless persons. Carbon sequestration by major forest is now
an important component of carbon trading and if properly
managed, it will bring additional income to the growers of
medicinal tree species. Lots of data have to be generated on
carbon sequestration of medicinal tree species for harnessing
this as a component of carbon trading. Identification
of elite strains of important medicinal tree species with
clear genetic markers for quality drug along with efficient
clonal propagation techniques for fast multiplication should
find a priority in the research. This would enable improvement
of the quality of medicine and also improve the credibility of
Indian Systems of Medicines. Investment
projection in XI plan on research and development of medicinal
plants is encouraging. There is enough funds available now
through National Medicinal Plant Board, ICAR, NAIP fund of
World Bank, CSIR, Central Sector Schemes of Ministry of
Agriculture, Horticulture Sharing
of project information is only possible if a uniform database
platform is created and is used by all the major players. I
wish some organization should come forward to create such
database platform with the help of IT professionals at the
earliest. Jai Hind ! Satyabrata Maiti |
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