MEDICINAL PLANT CONSERVATION AND GENETIC RESOURCES: EXAMPLES FROM THE TEMPERATE NORTHERN HEMISPHERE

While much attention has been placed on the loss of genetic diversity, especially as it relates to potential medicinal species loss in the world’s tropical rain forests, comparatively little attention has been placed on medicinal plant conservation in temperate regions.
The successful Chinese experience in developing cultivated plantations of formerly wild-harvested medicinal plants provides a model for other countries and regions.
In the United States plant conservation efforts focus on rare, threatened and endangered taxa.
Of the 70 indigenous medicinal plant species commercially harvested from the United States, there is no data to support how much of any species can be harvested on a sustainable yield basis – without reducing existing populations.
Basic research on population dynamics, demographics and reproductive biology on the involved species has yet to be conducted.
The example of medicinal plant genetic diversity loss and conservation in temperate North America is explored, with particular emphasis on the genera Echinacea (Asteraceae), Hamamelis (Hamamelidaceae), Podophyllum (Berberidaceae), Panax quinquefolius (Araliaceae), and Taxus (Taxaceae). Solutions to preventing the admixture of rare species in mixed lots of officially recognized medicinal source plants include manufacturers’ adherence to maintaining herbarium specimens properly identified by a qualified botanist.
International efforts to protect medicinal plants by monitoring import and export trade are largely symbolic.
The ultimate solution to medicinal plant conservation is medicinal plant cultivation.

WOCMAP I – Medicinal and Aromatic Plants Conference: part 4 of 4

S. Foster

https://doi.org/10.17660/ActaHortic.1993.330.6