Ethnomedicinal survey and in vitro anti-plasmodial activity of the palm Borassus aethiopum Mart

Gruca, Marta; Yu, Wei; Amoateng, Patrick; Nielsen, Morten A.; Poulsen, Thomas B.; Balslev, Henrik

doi:10.1016/j.jep.2015.09.010

Cited by 12 publications

(12 citation statements)

References 41 publications

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“…This is likely due to the fact that the medicinal uses were mostly ethnic-specific. The common use of fruits against malaria also consensually reported in this study has been recently confirmed by pharmacological prospects [ 35 ].…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 71%

“…Moreover, the greater commercial value of these two plant parts for women than men confirms B. aethiopum as a “women-palm” species (Fig. 9 ) as also reported in Brong Ahafo region in Ghana [ 35 ]. However, this great cultural and commercial value of fruits and hypocotyls if not well controlled may reduce regeneration potential in natural stands of B. aethiopum , threatening its population rejuvenation as reported for other species, e.g., Pentadesma butyracea [ 71 ].…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 66%

“…Medicinal use of B. aethiopum was also culturally important for surveyed informants and aligned with [ 35 ] who reported its medicinal use in 14 out of 28 African countries where it occurs and as the third most used palm species in traditional medicines in Africa. However, in spite of having four times more uses than food use-category (66 versus 16), only 5 were significant, suggesting a lack of consensus on most of the medicinal uses.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 63%

“…Although several ethnobotanical reports exist on the species over its distribution range [ 28 , 31 – 35 ], they are often narrowed to a locality or a small part of a country [ 35 ] and rarely used quantitative approaches to decipher complex interactions between humans and the species. Yet, such understanding could provide important baseline information for its sustainable use and management.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Traditional knowledge and cultural importance of Borassus aethiopum Mart. in Benin: interacting effects of socio-demographic attributes and multi-scale abundance

Salako

Moreira

Gbèdomon

et al. 2018

J Ethnobiology Ethnomedicine

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BackgroundEliciting factors affecting distribution of traditional knowledge (TK) and cultural importance of plant resources is central in ethnobiology. Socio-demographic attributes and ecological apparency hypothesis (EAH) have been widely documented as drivers of TK distribution, but their synergistic effect is poorly documented. Here, we focused on Borassus aethiopum, a socio-economic important agroforestry palm in Africa, analyzing relationships between the number of use-reports and cultural importance on one hand, and informant socio-demographic attributes (age category and gender) on the other hand, considering the EAH at multi-scale contexts. Our hypothesis is that effects of socio-demographic attributes on use-reports and cultural importance are shaped by both local (village level) and regional (chorological region level) apparency of study species. We expected so because distribution of knowledge on a resource in a community correlates to the versatility in the resource utilization but also connections among communities within a region.MethodsNine hundred ninety-two face-to-face individual semi-structured interviews were conducted in six villages of low versus high local abundance of B. aethiopum spanning three chorological regions (humid, sub-humid and semi-arid) also underlying a gradient of increasing distribution and abundance of B. aethiopum. Number of use-reports and score of importance of uses of B. aethiopum were recorded in six use-categories including medicine, food, handcraft, construction, firewood, and ceremonies and rituals. Data were analyzed using Poisson and ordered logistic models.ResultsInformants listed 121 uses for B. aethiopum: medicine (66 uses), handcraft (16 uses), food (16 uses), construction (12 uses), firewood (6 uses), and ceremonies and rituals (5 uses); but food use was the most culturally important use (2.45 ± 0.03), followed by construction (0.61 ± 0.03), medicinal (0.57 ± 0.03) and handcraft (0.56 ± 0.03), firewood (0.29 ± 0.02), and ceremonies and rituals (0.03 ± 0.01). Food use was the most important for women who were specialized in hypocotyls and fruits collection for commercialization. Men valued more the species for handcrafting, construction, and medicine. The number of use-reports was significantly dependent on age category and gender, and differences between age categories (young, adult, and old) in particular were dependent upon local and regional apparency. In particular, discrepancies among age categories were higher in areas of low abundance and distribution, which may be linked to different speed in the process of knowledge acquisition. In areas of low abundance, the species past abundance was also found instrumental in understanding current knowledge distribution.ConclusionFindings suggest that studies aiming at understanding relationship between current TK and cultural importance of a resource on one hand and socio-demographic attributes on the other hand should consider the resource current local and regional apparency but further its local past abundance...

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 71%

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 66%

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 63%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 2 more Smart Citations

Traditional knowledge and cultural importance of Borassus aethiopum Mart. in Benin: interacting effects of socio-demographic attributes and multi-scale abundance

Salako

Moreira

Gbèdomon

et al. 2018

J Ethnobiology Ethnomedicine

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“…It is widely distributed across West and Central Africa, where it is present as wild populations. The fan palm is classified as a non-timber forest products (NTFPs)-providing plant [22,23], since the different parts of the plant are used for various purposes by local populations: hypocotyls and fruits for food, fruit odor as shrew repellent, stipe for construction, roots and leaves for traditional medicine, leaves for crafts [24–28]…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Transferability, development of Single Sequence Repeat (SSR) markers and application to the analysis of genetic diversity and population structure of the African fan palm (Borassus aethiopumMart.) in Benin

Kpatènon

Salako

Santoni

et al. 2020

Preprint

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2 to the analysis of genetic diversity and population structure of the African fan palm 3 (Borassus aethiopum Mart.) in Benin 4 5Abstract: 34 In Sub-Saharan Africa, the fan palm Borassus aethiopum Mart. is an important non-timber 35 forest product-providing palm that faces multiple anthropogenic threats to its genetic diversity. 36 However, this species is so far under-studied, which prevents its sustainable development as a 37 resource. 38 The present work is a first attempt at characterizing the genetic diversity of this palm species 39 as well as its spatial structuration in Benin, West Africa. During a first phase we implemented 40 a microsatellite markers-based approach relying on the reported transferability of primers 41 developed in other palm species and found that, in disagreement with previously published 42 results, only 22.5% of the 80 markers tested enabled amplification of African fan palm DNA 43 and polymorphism detection was insufficient. During a second phase, we therefore generated a 44 B. aethiopum-specific genomic dataset through high-throughput sequencing and used it for the 45 de novo detection of potential microsatellite markers. Among these, 11 enabled polymorphism 46 detection and were further used for analyzing genetic diversity in nine B. aethiopum 47 populations. 48Our results show that genetic diversity of Beninese fan palm populations is low, with an overall 49 average expected heterozygosity (He) of 0.354. Moreover, the positive values of the fixation 50 index (F) in populations from both the Central (Soudano-Guinean) and the Southern (Guinean) 51 regions suggest limited gene flows. Our analysis show that sampled B. aethiopum populations 52 are clustered into two groups, one spanning populations from both the Southern and most of 53 the Central region, and the other including the Central population of Savè (which also has the 54 highest He) and populations from the North.55In light of our results, we discuss the use of inter-species transfer vs. de novo development of 56 microsatellite markers in genetic diversity analyses targeting under-studied species. We also 57 suggest future applications for the molecular resources generated through the present study. 59Many plant species remain under-studied due to their low economic importance, complicated 60 biology and/or the absence of available genome sequence information. Upon initiating a 61 research project aimed at characterizing the genetic diversity of such a species, researchers may 62 be confronted with the situation that some resources can be found in more or less distantly 63 related taxa. In such cases, the first step is often to assess whether some of these resources, such 64 as molecular markers, can be used to study the new species. Provided that the "source" species 65 display enough genetic similarities to the "target" species and that marker transferability has 66 been previously assessed, this first step may lead to quick progress in a cost-effective manner. 67In many instances, transferring markers betw...

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Impacts of land use types on spatial patterns and neighbourhood distance of the agroforestry palm Borassus aethiopum Mart. in two climatic regions in Benin, West Africa

et al. 2018

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Ethnomedicinal survey and in vitro anti-plasmodial activity of the palm Borassus aethiopum Mart

Cited by 12 publications

References 41 publications

Traditional knowledge and cultural importance of Borassus aethiopum Mart. in Benin: interacting effects of socio-demographic attributes and multi-scale abundance

Traditional knowledge and cultural importance of Borassus aethiopum Mart. in Benin: interacting effects of socio-demographic attributes and multi-scale abundance

Transferability, development of Single Sequence Repeat (SSR) markers and application to the analysis of genetic diversity and population structure of the African fan palm (Borassus aethiopumMart.) in Benin

Impacts of land use types on spatial patterns and neighbourhood distance of the agroforestry palm Borassus aethiopum Mart. in two climatic regions in Benin, West Africa

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