Abstract
Like other populations of developing countries, most of the populations of Ethiopia depend greatly on the use of traditional herbal medicines as the primary source of health care. However, these resources have been degraded throughout the country. Therefore, recording and documenting medicinal plants are essential for the future conservation of the species. Thus, the current study is related to this issue. Three hundred ninety-five informants participated in this study. The main data collection tools were semistructured interviews, discussions, and observation. The data were analyzed using both qualitative and quantitative methods. The quantitative methods (informant consensus factor, fidelity level) were used to analyze the level of homogeneity of the data, the agreements of informants, and the healing potential of medicinal plants. The ranking exercises (preference and direct matrix ranking) were used to quantify the most preferred and multipurpose medicinal plants. A statistical test was conducted using SPSS version 20 to test knowledge differences among the people. Following the analysis, 112 species of medicinal plants with 62 families were recorded. Most of the species were herbs, of which Fabaceae was the dominant family. Blood pressure and asthma were the most commonly reported human health problems. Most of the remedies were prepared from leaves, and most of them were prepared by pounding and were applied orally. Gastrointestinal diseases had the highest informant consensus. Five medicinal plants were recorded with the highest healing potential value for malaria, asthma, tapeworm, cough, and stomach ulcer. Verbascum sinaiticum Benth. was the most preferred medicinal plant in treating blood pressure. Trigonella foenum-graecum L. had the highest use value. The analysis results showed that local people showed significant knowledge differences (p < 0.05). In conclusion, the indigenous people have a wealth of indigenous herbal knowledge. Therefore, to sustain the wealth of indigenous knowledge of the districts, immediate and well-designed conservation practices of medicinal plants should be conducted.
Highlights
The populations of developing countries firmly persist on using traditional medicines as their primary source of health care [1]
According to [3], around 80% of the population of Ethiopia depends on traditional medicinal plants for their primary health care needs
The results showed that the current study areas are rich in medicinal plants compared to the other parts of Ethiopia such as the Babile district (51 species) [6], the Amaro district (56 species) [29], the Enderta district (27 species), and the Alamata district (25 species) [30]
Summary
The populations of developing countries firmly persist on using traditional medicines as their primary source of health care [1]. According to [3], around 80% of the population of Ethiopia depends on traditional medicinal plants for their primary health care needs. About 95% of the traditional medicine of the country has been prepared from plants [4]. This is because of the rich indigenous knowledge on medicinal plant use [5]. A privileged concentration of medicinal plant knowledge is found in the South and Southwestern parts of Ethiopia because of the high cultural diversity of the population of these areas [5, 6]
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