Abstract
Leguminosae is an economically important family that contains a large number of medicinal plants, many of which are widely used in African traditional medicine. Angola holds a great socio-cultural diversity and is one of the richest floristic regions of the world, with over 900 native Leguminosae species. This study is the first to assess the medicinal uses of the legumes in Angola and provides new data to promote the conservation and the sustainable use of these unique resources. We document the ethnobotanical knowledge on Angola by reviewing the most important herbarium collections and literature, complemented by recent field surveys. Our results revealed that 127 native legume species have medicinal uses and 65% of them have other important uses by local populations. The species with most medicinal applications are Erythrina abyssinica, Bauhinia thonningii and Pterocarpus angolensis. The rich flora found in Angola suggests an enormous potential for discovery of new drugs with therapeutic value. However, the overexploitation and the indiscriminate collection of legumes for multiple uses such as forage, food, timber and medical uses, increases the threats upon the native vegetation. Efforts to assess the conservation status of these species are urgently needed, and future actions should promote the sustainable use of medicinal plants in Angola together with the implementation of conservation strategies.
Highlights
Over the past decades, following the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) held in Rio de Janeiro in 1992, the conservation of biodiversity has come to be understood as an essential aspect of sustainable development worldwide (Najam & Cleveland, 2005)
Our results reveal that 127 Leguminosae species and subspecies are recognized as medicinal plants used in Angolan traditional medicine (Table 1)
It is essential that further research on the traditional uses of plants by local populations must be carried out, which will require: (i) systematic field surveys, including interviews with local communities; (ii) a review of medicinal data and assembling a specialized literature; and (iii) international cooperation to enable the recovery of scientific knowledge associated with botanical collections, mostly kept in European herbaria
Summary
Over the past decades, following the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) held in Rio de Janeiro in 1992, the conservation of biodiversity has come to be understood as an essential aspect of sustainable development worldwide (Najam & Cleveland, 2005). In sub-Saharan Africa, the majority of people depend mainly on natural resources for subsistence and income generation and urgent actions are required to achieve the global goals to reduce the rate of biodiversity loss, degradation of ecosystems and subsequent reduction in goods and services that can be obtained from it (Mertz et al, 2007). In this region, medicinal plants are one of the most important elements of biodiversity, because of their role in ecosystem services such as healthcare, cultural value and heritage, local economics and human well-being (Okigbo, Eme & Ogbogu, 2008). In order to achieve this objective, reliable data are needed on their distribution and level of use, especially in understudied regions
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