Herbicide on the hill

But fifteen years after Balco wound up its bauxite mining operations, the medicinal plants of the Gandhamardan hill range appear to be in serious jeopardy again.

Apart from 210 million tonne of bauxite reserves, the Gandhamardan hill range, located on the border of Bolagir and Bargarh districts in western Orissa, has one of the richest bio-diversities in the country. After an extensive study, the Botanical Survey of India (BSI) found 220 plant species of medicinal value and 2,700 angiosperms in the area.

A study by H O Saxena and M. Brahma of the Regional Research Laboratory recorded 200 medical plants of medicinal use, 77 of which are new.

Experts fear that this reserve of medicinal plants could be lost in the next 30 years if the indiscriminate collection and smuggling of herbs by local villagers is not stopped.

"The mainstay of the local villagers, who are poor and landless, is collecting and supplying herbs to unidentified traders from outside who have shown scant regard for ecology," says Dhanjay Bhoi, an environmental activist of Manhang village, the first village to oppose Balco's mining project.

His concern is shared by Pradeep Purohit, a firebrand who led the movement against Balco and heads Gandhardan Suraksha Yuba Parishad.

"Recurrent droughts, the felling of trees and faulty methods of harvesting medicinal plants have taken a toll on Gandhmardan," Purohit says ruefully.

He said that organised smuggling of medicinal plants has severely damaged several plant species and prevented their growth. Besides, the abundant water resources of the hill range draws hordes of winter nomadic communities from Rajasthan which drive thousands of goats, sheep and camels into the hill range's forests, thereby damaging plant life there.

The state forest department which is supposed to guard this botanical wealth is not exactly in a tizzy about all these developments. "Here, there is no organised way of farming the medicinal plants which just grow in the wild. So it is very difficult to guard these species. Any villager can walk into the forest covering the hill and collect the herbs," points out a senior forest official.

Unless the government takes steps to channel the collection and marketing of medicinal plants and herbs in an organised manner as it is doing for other forest produce like sal seed or kendu leave, smugglers will continue to plunder these medicinal resources while the state loses revenue, he adds.

Former member of Parliament B S Hota, who represented the Sambalpur constituency and has conducted studies on the bio-diversity of Gandhamardan, has written to several people in authority, including the chief minister of the state, drawing attention to the need to conserve the medicinal wealth of Gandhmardan.

Hota stresses the importance of educating local people about the ecological and market value of medicinal plants. More organised efforts leading to value-added marketing will not only enhance the income of the local people but also have a beneficial impact on bio-diversity.

R K Agrawal, chairman of the Bangalore-based Natural Remedies Private Ltd, who has been trading in medicinal plants for the last four decades, says that the primary collectors at the village level are mostly ignorant about the quality of medicinal plants required either for local industry or the export market.

This is leading to indiscriminate depletion of plants without much commercial benefit, he says. For example, harida collected from Orissa in huge quantities fetches only Rs 3 per kg in the Chhatishgarh market, but ggod quality harida which the aryurvedic industry requires is priced at Rs 12 per kg.

If the locals are trained in quality, conservation and value addition, they will earn four times what they are earning now, he says.

That's a point the state government would do well to ponder.