Abstract
BackgroundLocal plant knowledge typically is unevenly distributed within a community. This knowledge variation is important in understanding people’s relationship with their environment. Here we ask about knowledge variation among farmers’ families in the Napf region of Switzerland.MethodsIn 2008 and 2009, 60 adults and children living on 14 farms were interviewed about known and used plant species, and the data analyzed for knowledge variation. The farms were chosen by random stratified sampling, and freelisting and semi-structured interviews were conducted individually in the local idiom. The data were organized in an access database and analyzed with descriptive statistics, correlations, Mann–Whitney U tests and cultural domain analysis.ResultsTotally, 456 folk taxa were listed, whereas frequently listed species are common meadow and forest species. Uses were indicated for 391 taxa, most of them culinary, followed by fodder, wood, medicinal and ornamental uses. Local plant knowledge correlates with age and gender. Due to professional specialization, adults above 20 years have broader plant knowledge than children and adolescents. This is true for almost all examined habitat and plant use categories except for toy uses. Women and men share a common body of plant knowledge especially about herbaceous grassland species and woody species. Specialized knowledge of men is linked to cattle fodder and the processing of wood, specialized knowledge of women concerns edible, medicinal and ornamental plants, often garden species, but also herbaceous forest species.ConclusionIn a rural region like the Napf, people retain a solid basis of plant knowledge. The variation of plant knowledge within farmers’ families of this region reflects sociocultural patterns. As these patterns are changing and as (agro)biodiversity is declining, local plant knowledge in the Napf region is suspected to undergo a mainstreaming process.
Highlights
Research about intracultural variation of environmental knowledge has shown that members of different social groups have different approaches to the environment and specialize in different domains of environmental knowledge [1,2,3]
In the community of Boumba, Niger, elderly people were found to know most about medicinal plants, and women generally know most about food plants and mid-aged men about fodder plants [1]; in the savannas of South Africa, midaged women and young people were found to be highly knowledgeable regarding woody plant species [13]; in the mestizo communities in Venezuela’s Caura Basin, men and older people know most about natural history of plants, while men’s and women’s knowledge about medicinal plants is equal and increases only for foreign mestizos with age [15]; in Bahia state, Brazil, women know generally more about medicinal plants than men, and for both, the knowledge increases with age [2]
Aim of the study This study aims to explore the state of local plant knowledge among farmers’ families of the Napf region in Switzerland
Summary
Research about intracultural variation of environmental knowledge has shown that members of different social groups have different approaches to the environment and specialize in different domains of environmental knowledge [1,2,3]. Often interrelated, were found to influence the distribution of local plant knowledge Among these figure ethnicity [1, 5], education [6,7,8,9], exposure to natural environments including homegardens [7, 10, 11], resident place [7, 11,12,13,14], income class [12], language [7] and occupation [7, 8, 11]. Local plant knowledge typically is unevenly distributed within a community This knowledge variation is important in understanding people’s relationship with their environment. We ask about knowledge variation among farmers’ families in the Napf region of Switzerland
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