Traditional botanical knowledge of medicinal plants in a “quilombola” community in the Atlantic Forest of northeastern Brazil

Abstract

Plant resources are essential to the survival of the human species, and they play several important roles in maintaining the quality of life. The purpose of this study was to assess the traditional knowledge of medicinal plants in the Ipiranga quilombola community on the south shore of the state of Paraı ´ba, northeast of Brazil. Ethnobotanical data were collected using semi-structured interviews that were performed with the head of the family for all the domestic units in the community (total of 100 individuals). Data were qualitative and quantitative (Use-Value index and informant consensus factor) analyzed. A total of 69 species belonging to 38 families were mentioned by the respondents. Only two medicinal species (Stryphnodendron pulcherrimum (Willd.) Hochr and Handroanthus impetiginosus (Mart. ex DC.) Mattos) are found in the surrounded Atlantic Forest area. All the other medicinal species are cultivated in backyards. The species with the highest Use-Values were Alpinia zerumbet (Pers.) B.L. Burtt. & R.M. Sm. (colony). The medicinal species were indicated for the treatment of 66 diseases, which were classified into 14 categories of body systems. Respiratory system disorders (0.54), gastrointestinal system disorders (0.43), and a genitourinary system disorder (0.42) were the categories with the highest consensus values among the respondents. The research showed that despite having a health center close to the community, the Ipiranga community still uses medicinal plants to cure diseases, with most species being cultivated in backyards.

Participatory methods on the recording of traditional knowledge about medicinal plants in Atlantic forest, Ubatuba, São Paulo, Brazil

“…5) Local partners perform other daily activities that guarantee their livelihoods and must reconcile these activities with fieldwork. Therefore, the data obtained here are very robust and integrated with local perceptions, compared to other ethnobotanical studies developed in traditional communities of the Atlantic Forest [17,30,31], Amazonian forest [32,33], scrublands of the Brazilian Cerrado [34], and Pantanal wetlands [35]. In this sense, 82 medicinal plants were registered in this study, and 148 other plants with different ethnobotanical uses, such as: food, shipbuilding, construction, combustion, dyes and handicrafts, were registered by residents in this same survey but the data are actually unpublished.…”

“…They were grouped, with the aid of local partners, into 12 categories of medicinal use: circulatory system (20 species and 9 uses), gastrointestinal system (13 and 11), respiratory system (13 and 5), central nervous system (12 and 8), inflammatory process (10 and 6), genitourinary system (7 and 4), skin diseases (4 and 3), parasitic diseases (4 and 2), osteomuscular system (3 and 3), other uses (2 and 2), endocrine system (1 and 1) and the ocular system (1 and 1) (as seen in Fig 2 and Table 2). Previous studies have also found that the two first categories, which had the largest numbers of uses above, were the most frequent in other communities, such as the Atlantic forest community [31,[41][42][43][44]. The large number of plant species indicated for gastrointestinal disorders in these studies could be associated with the absence of basic sanitation, which can account for a variety of diseases linked to the faecal-oral route, since the majority of the therapeutic uses of this category refer to the treatment of stomach ache.…”

“…The same species may belong to more than one of the 12 categories of use. PLOS ONE [31,43], and according to Almeida and Albuquerque [48], this outcome occurred because respiratory diseases are more common in this biome and because their symptoms are clearer, thus favouring the identifications of these diseases and the identification of these plants. Fifty-four species (65.8%), indicated with the asterisk in Table 1, are native to the Atlantic forest, while the others are exotic or naturalized or have not been fully identified, demonstrating the floral diversity of the region, which was influenced by European and African people during the civilizing process during the colonial period in Brazil.…”

Temporal Assessment of the Medicinal Plant Trade in Public Markets of the State of Paraíba, Northeastern Brazil

“…Many recent studies in Brazil and around the globe have recorded the knowledge and use of medicinal plants, both in rural [e.g. [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8] and urban areas [e.g. [9][10][11][12][13][14][15].…”

Conhecimento popular sobre plantas medicinais utilizadas no município de Mafra, SC, Brasil

“…No Brasil, a população possui uma longa tradição no uso de plantas medicinais para o tratamento de diversas patologias, fato que tem chamado a atenção de pesquisadores para o estudo mais detalhado sobre as espécies (1) . O conhecimento tradicional brasileiro sobre plantas tem influência de várias culturas distintas, como colonizadores europeus, grupos nativo-americanos e africanos, sendo esse conhecimento passado hereditariamente para várias gerações (2) . Apesar do conhecimento popular ter sido bem disseminado no país, alguns fatores podem comprometer a dispersão do conhecimento popular e a preservação das espécies de plantas.…”