Estudo etnobotânico das plantas utilizadas como medicinais no Assentamento Santo Antônio, Cajazeiras, PB, Brasil.

Abstract

The ethnobotany researches are today important register and document tools of the empiric uses of medicinal plants in traditional communities, generating useful knowledge to the development of new medicines, to the conservation of the biodiversity, the valorization of knowledge and of the local culture. With the purpose of contributing to the study of the medicinal flora of the state of Paraiba, this research aimed to characterize the knowledge and the use of the medicinal the species occurred in the Santo Antonio Settlement, in Cajazeiras, located in the high sertão of Paraíba. It has been aimed to register and rescue the popular information about the medicinal the species utilized, regarding its therapeutic use, thus, granting access to the more systemized information to people of that community. The following methodological procedures were applied: participant observation, semi-structured interviews and surveys with questions concerning the respondent and the mentioned plants, comprising 26 participants of both genders, in a total of 32 families, between the ages of 30 to 75 years age who were selected by the level of knowledge about the medicinal use of plant species. The data was collected between the months of September and December, 2008. 70 medicinal species of common use were recorded, which belonged to 39 botanic families, existent in community orchard, in the residences yards, near to houses and woods. Regarding the medicinal arboreal focused in our research, it has been recorded 18 species belonging to 12 families: Anacardiaceae, Bignoniaceae, Bombacaceae, Capparaceae, Chrysobalanaceae, Dilleniaceae, Fabaceae, Monimiaceae, Oleaceae, Polygonaceae, Rhamnaceae end Verbenaceae. Concerning the use and the knowledge of plant resources it is concluded that: the medicinal the species are used during the year, and they need further attention and investigation; conventional medicine and phytotherapy coexist in the settlement; the informers know most of the local flora, of which they make intensive use.