The document discusses several organizations involved in conservation efforts, including the WWF, UNESCO, and the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. It then focuses on methods for understanding local plant use and preferences, emphasizing participatory research where local people play a key role in the research process. A variety of survey methods are described for gathering information on plant use and prioritizing conservation efforts, including discussions with resource users and participatory rural appraisal techniques.

1. Participatory community
Ethnobotany

2. WWF
• WWF (formerly the World Wide Fund For
Nature), founded in 1961, is the world’s
• largest private nature conservation organization.
It consists of 29 national organizations
• and associates, and works in more than 100
countries. The coordinating
• headquarters are in Gland, Switzerland. The WWF
mission is to conserve biodiversity, to
• ensure that the use of renewable natural
resources is sustainable and to promote
• actions to reduce pollution and wasteful
consumption.

3. UNESCO
• The United Nations Educational, Scientific and
Cultural Organization (UNESCO) is the
• only UN agency with a mandate spanning the
fields of science (including social
• sciences), education, culture and
communication. UNESCO has over 40 years of
experience
• in testing interdisciplinary approaches to
solving environmental and development

4. • problems in programmes such as that on Man
and the Biosphere (MAB). An international
• network of biosphere reserves provides sites
for conservation of biological
• diversity, long-term ecological research and
testing and demonstrating approaches to
• the sustainable use of natural resources.

5. ROYAL BOTANIC GARDENS, KEW
• The Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, has 150
professional staff and associated researchers
• and works with partners in over 42 countries.
Research focuses on taxonomy, preparation
• of floras, economic botany, plant biochemistry
and many other specialized fields.
• The Royal Botanic Gardens has one of the
largest herbaria in the world and an excellent
• botanic library.

6. Participatory community
• The methods outlined in this chapter are
• the steps used to get a better understanding
• of people’s preferences and the demand
• for particular plant species. Although
• some plant uses such as harvesting of
• wood for fuel, building or commercial
• woodcarving are more obvious, occurring
• throughout the year and in large volume,
• wild plant gathering is often part of a
• ‘hidden economy’ unnoticed by outsiders.

7. • Consequently, careful field observation,
• sensitive consultation with local harvesters
• and strategic planning are required before
• any monitoring takes place. Even the
• identity of some commonly harvested
• species, often well known to local people,
• is often poorly known to protected area
• managers or outside researchers.

8. Local priorities:
• A reversal of roles has always been
understood
• in ethnobotanical work. Formally trained
• outsiders, whatever their experience, have
• a lot to learn from the insights of local
• people who are acknowledged within their
• own communities as experts on local
vegetation.

9. • As a result, local people play a
• crucial role at several parts in the research
• process, including research design, specimen
• and data collection, interpretation of
• data and, less commonly, the presentation
• of research results back to the community.
• Amongst development practitioners, this
• type of approach, where local people help
• in conducting research, has given rise to
• the term ‘participatory research’. It is
• important to realize that this does not refer
• to a single research method, as Brian Pratt
• and Peter Loizos (1992) point out:

10. • ‘Although some writers make it sound as though
there is a separate “participatory” research
method, this is misleading. The idea of
participation is more an overall guiding
philosophy of how to proceed, than a selection of
specific methods. So when people talk about
participatory research, participatory monitoring
and participatory evaluation, on the whole they
are not discussing a self-contained set of
methodologies, but a situation whereby the
methods being used have included an element of
strong involvement and consultation on the part
of the subjects of the research.

11. • Considerable common ground for joint
• work in resource management often exists.
• Resource users, development workers and
• protected area managers often have a
• common interest in cases of conflicts over
• valued but vulnerable plant resources.
• This can be due to restrictions on harvesting
• of rare species or vegetation within
• protected areas, to overexploitation
• arising from demand exceeding supply for
• useful wild plant species, or to conflicts
• between local harvesters and people from
• outside the community.

12. • Involvement of resource users as research
partners is an essential part of a successful
conservation strategy for useful plant species that
are susceptible to overexploitation. There are
three main reasons for this.
• Firstly, the knowledge and perceptions
• of resource users such as traditional
• healers, craft workers and commercial
• medicinal plant harvesters provide
• valuable insights into the insufficiency of useful
• plant species.

13. • Secondly, dialogue with resource users
• is a crucial part of developing conservation
• and resource management proposals
• with, rather than for, resource users.
• Thirdly, it enables specialist user
• groups to be identified. Rural communities
• are not homogeneous, but are complex
• networks, divided on the basis of power,
• gender and specialist interest groups.

14. • Choosing the right methods
• Choices of methods should be made case by-
• case on the basis of preliminary
• planning, bearing in mind timetable and
• budget constraints.
• Once permission for research work
• has been granted at a national and local
• level, then researchers need to decide on
• the survey methods that are appropriate.
• Commonly used methods are:

15. • discussions with individual resource
• users;
• • group interviews and discussions;
• • rapid rural appraisal (RRA), participatory
• rural appraisal (PRA) and
• participatory assessment, monitoring
• and evaluation (PAME);

16. • • social surveys using various sampling
• techniques and structured or semistructured
• interviews;
• • participant observation;
• • ethnobotanical inventory methods;
• • sample surveys based on field records
• with local resource users;
• • surveys of plants sold

17. • In the past five years, several excellent
• manuals and reviews have been published
• that give detailed descriptions of different
• methods. Many of these are readily available
• through organizations supporting field work in
developing countries.