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Ethnobotanical
Leaflets 13: 734-38. 2009. Conservation and
Biodiversity Erosion in J.
Kayode1,4, R. A. Jose2 and O.E. Ige3 1Department of Plant
Science, University of Ado-Ekiti, �2Department
of Science Technology, Rufus Giwa Polytechnic, Department of Plant Science and Biotechnology 4E-mail: jokayode@ymail.com ����� Issued Abstract ����������� A combination of social survey and direct field
observation was used to assess the botanicals used in the treatment of
sexually transmitted diseases in Owo region of Key words: Botanicals,
sexually transmitted diseases, Introduction ��������������� In
the recent times, there seems to be an unabated increase in the incidences of
sexually transmitted diseases despite the series of awareness programs by
governmental and non-governmental organisations. Previous studies had
asserted that many indigenous groups in ����������� The Owo indigenous group,
popularly referred to as Owomode, is a distinct group of Yoruba in the rainforest
zone of Nigeria. They are extremely conscious of their culture and tradition
which include the use of botanicals for health maintenance. The study being
reported here is part of on-going studies
on the ethnobotanical utilization in Materials and Methods ����������� A combination of social survey and direct field
observation (after Kayode 2002, Kayode
and Ogunleye 2008) was used in this study. Three
major communities, each of which possessed big market centers were selected.
In each of these communities, five botanical vendors, ten indigenes who had
maintained continuous domicile in the region for minimum of ten years were
selected and interviewed with the aid of semi-structured questionnaire
matrix. ����������� Botanicals
identified as been used in for the cure of sexually transmitted diseases
(STDs) were documented and their relative abundance determined by taken into
consideration the time taken to physically come across the species in a
distance of 500m form the center of the community. Voucher specimens of the
species identified were obtained and later deposited at the herbarium of the
Department of Plant Science, University of Ado-Ekiti,
����������� Secondary
information was obtained from records and key informants which consisted of
the officials of the Local Governments, Results and Discussion�� ����������� A
total of 33 botanicals were observed to be commonly used for the cure of STDs
in the study area. These species belong to a total of 28 families (Table 1).
The part mostly utilized was the leaves. The leaves of 16 of the botanicals
were used. This constitutes 48% of the botanicals.Other
parts include the roots (27%), stem barks/stem (24%) and fruits (12%). The
forest constituted the major primary source of these species. 20 of the
botanicals, that is 61% of the botanicals were claimed to be sourced
primarily from the aboriginal forests of the communities. Household farms
constituted the major secondary source as 52% of the botanicals were sourced
from farms while the major tertiary source was the herbal markets section in
the communities from where over 40% of the botanicals were sourced. ����������� The
dependency of the respondents on the aboriginal forests and household farms
confirmed the earlier assertions by Kayode et. al. (2008), Kayode
and Omotoyinbo (2008, 2009) that the use of
botanicals was freely assessable to the rural and urban resource-poor. Also
the availability of botanical parts in major markets of the study area,
though not a new phenomenon, confirmed the use of medicinal botanicals as
important source of income in the study area. While the extraction methods
used in most of these botanicals (leaves) could be said to be non-predatory,
same cannot be said of the following species whose stem or stem barks or/and
roots were used. They are A. difformis, A. djalonensis, C. gabonensis, D. guineense, D. senegambiensis, K. ivorensis,
M. puberula, P. angolensis,
S. anceps, S. mombin, T. macroptera, T. potatoria, U. afzeli and Z. zanthoxyloides. All these species were not even
cultivated in the study area. Field observation revealed that hours of man
time were taken before samples of these species were found in the study area.
This observation tends to suggest that they were presently rare in the
abundance scale. F. capiensis
was observed to be found occasionally in the study area but field
observation revealed that its being domesticated already existed in the study
area where it is being cultivated as shade tree and wind breaker. In conclusion,
the conservation of these species, especially the identified rare species, is
now desirable. Previous strategies already suggested by Kayode
et al. (2009) in a study conducted
in other part of References Kayode, J. 2002. Ethnobotanical survey and
conservation of plant species used for curing malaria in Kayode, J. and Ogunleye,
T. 2008. Checklist and Status of Plant Species Used as Spices in Kayode, J.,
Christmas, E. and Kayode, G. M. 2008. Checklist and
Conservation of Botanicals
Used For Natality by the Okpe-Speaking
People of Research Journal of Medicinal Plants. 2(1):
16-21. Kayode, J. and Omotoyinbo, M. A. 2008. Cultural
Erosion and biodiversity : conserving chewing stick knowledge in ����������� Kayode, J. and Omotoyinbo, M. A. 2009. Ethnobotanical
utilization and conservation of chewing sticks
plant species in �4(1):1-9. Kayode, J., Ige. O. E. and Opeyemi, Ethnobotanical Leaflets
13,
564-567. Table 1. Botanicals
used in the cure of STDs in Owo region of
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