Ethnomedicine
and/or Ethnoveterinary medicine is a growing area of research. More and
more scientists, medical and/or veterinary practitioners, field workers
in developing countries, and livestock owners are becoming interested
in medicinal plants. A simplistic definition for ethnomedicine is:
local or indigenous knowledge and methods for caring for, healing, and
managing human lives and livestock. This includes social practices and
ways in which livestock are incorporated into farming systems A
conference on ethnoveterinary practices for west and central Africa was
held in Kaduna between 14th-16th August recently (Gefu et al. 2000).
The Workshop documents the local knowledge systems and technology on
the use of plant and animal genetic resouirces of pastoral and
livestock producing communities in Africa. Practices range from
medicinal plants to the use of plants to improve, for instance, shelf
life, taste or palatability of animal produce. A similar one was held
earlier in Nairobi (ILRI and IT Kenya, 1997). A Workshop on
Bioprospecting, Marketing and Benefit sharing at the local level in
west Africa was organised by he Commonwelath Science Council in
collaboration with the Federal Government of Nigeria was held in Jos on
the 11th – 15th June, 2001. The Workshop after extensive deliberations
on papers presented adopted among other resolutions that there is:
