Traditional skincare plants in South Africa are running out
Ethnobotany
The bark, roots, and leaves behind generations of handmade skincare come from slow-growing wild plants, and once a population gets stripped for sale in herbal markets, it can take decades to come back if it comes back at all.
Scientists talked to people in six South African villages about the plants their families have used for skincare and cosmetics for generations, things like leaves rubbed on skin or bark and roots ground into treatments. They catalogued 36 different species, mostly herbs and trees, and then checked each one against official conservation lists. Sixteen of those 36 plants turned out to already be in trouble, listed as Vulnerable, Endangered, or Declining, largely because people are picking them faster than they can regrow.
Key Findings
36 plant species documented as traditional cosmetics across six Eastern Cape villages based on interviews with 79 participants.
Herbs (39%) and trees (31%) were the main plant sources; leaves (27.5%), roots (17.9%), and bark/bulbs (16.7% each) were the most-used plant parts.
16 of the 36 species are already at risk of extinction: 5 Vulnerable, 3 Endangered, and 8 Declining or Near Threatened, driven by overharvesting for medicine and herbal markets.
chevron_right Technical Summary
Researchers interviewed 79 people across six villages in South Africa's Eastern Cape about the 36 wild plants their communities traditionally use as cosmetics, finding that nearly half of those species are already vulnerable, endangered, or declining because of overharvesting for medicine and herbal markets.
Abstract Preview
Original paper
Cultural importance, availability, and conservation status of cosmetic plants in the Eastern Cape province, South Africa: implications for sustainability
Medicinal plants have been used as sources of cosmetic and personal products since time immemorial. In this study, plant species used as cosmetics in the Eastern Cape Province and associated tradit...
open_in_new Read full abstractAbstract copyright held by the original publisher.
Was this useful?
Want to tell us more? (optional)
Thanks for the note!
Something went wrong — please try again.
Too many submissions. Try again in an hour.
Rapid disruption of pollination function by the invasive plant Impatiens glan...
That pretty pink-flowered plant spreading along your local riverbank or woodland edge could be quietly starving native wildflowers of the bee visits they nee...
Medicinal plants are species that produce bioactive chemical compounds with therapeutic applications, a characteristic studied extensively in ethnobotanical and phytochemical research. This field is vital to plant science because it reveals how plants evolved complex chemical defense and secondary
arrow_forward Explore topic