key: cord-0968928-invv8nl6
authors: Gowthami, R.; Sharma, Neelam; Pandey, Ruchira; Agrawal, Anuradha
title: Status and consolidated list of threatened medicinal plants of India
date: 2021-05-25
journal: Genet Resour Crop Evol
DOI: 10.1007/s10722-021-01199-0
sha: aa50433ce173be871fc2a7b35833cb1b84f5126b
doc_id: 968928
cord_uid: invv8nl6

A wide array of medicinal plants in India, primarily used by locals for health care, have found wide acceptance and adoption globally (either directly or processed) due to distinct advantages of good results, low or no side-effects and ease of access to general public. Indigenous and traditional systems of medicine in practice since historical times have shown potential (direct or indirect as immune-boosters) against many dreaded ailments including the recent global pandemic of COVID-19. With prediction of sixth mass extinction, there is worldwide concern as majority of these plants, collected from natural stands, are also facing threat of extinction. Since 1990s concerted efforts have been directed towards assessment of threat status, the basic requirement for prioritizing conservation activity to various species of plants and animals. In literature there is staggered information regarding list of threatened plants, including medicinal plants of India, compiled at either state level or national or international level. Analysis of these publications led to collation of a consolidated list of 84 species and the same is presented here. A brief account of conservation efforts in India at national level and supportive policy framework is also included. This compilation is aimed to serve as a comprehensive reference especially for beginners, researchers, conservationists, foresters, pharmaceutical professionals as well as policy makers.

Biodiversity conservation is a demanding task that includes scientific, social, and political challenges (Pelletier et al. 2018) . Given the enormous diversity of species and limited resources available to undertake these conservation programs, prioritization of species for conservation, assessment of threat status and the most suitable strategy to be adopted become the basic pre-requisites. To serve this objective, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), a membership union composed of both government and civil society organizations, was established. An IUCN 'Red List of Threatened Species' was developed, which provides extinction risk and species distribution (Pollock et al. 2003; Brooks et al. 2004) . As per IUCN classification, species are assigned a ranked threat category, such as extinct (EX), extinct in wild (EW), critically endangered (CR), endangered (EN), vulnerable (VU), near threatened (NT), least concern (LC) and data deficient (DD) (Fig. 1 ) through assessment against quantitative criteria based on indicators of extinction risk (Collen et al. 2016; Hammer and Khoshbakht 2005) . As the threat categories itself are basic keys to prioritize conservation this list is the globally accepted method of assessing species extinction risk (Collar 1996) . Countries around the world are adapting these criteria to prioritize species for conservation, to determine the conservation approaches and to frame regulatory and policy decisions for conservation, and multilateral agreements (Maxted et al. 1997; Rodrigues et al. 2006) . Figure 2 depicts the estimated number of threatened species (till date) in Kingdom Animalia, Plantae, Chromista and Fungi, globally and in India as per the IUCN assessment (IUCN 2020). Because of ever increasing human population and anthropogenic activities, species extinction rate has increased to hundred or thousandfold compared to background extinctions, bringing to forefront the 'sixth mass extinction' crisis (Shivanna 2020) .

India has 2.4% of world's area with 8% of global biodiversity and is one of the 12 mega diversity countries of the world (Myers et al. 2000; Bapat et al. 2008) . Among the world's 35 global biodiversity hotspots (GBH), four (Himalayas, Indo-Burma, Sundaland and Western Ghats) fall in the Indian geopolitical territory (Jaisankar et al. 2018) . This richness of phyto-diversity in India is owing to existence of 15 agro-climatic zones with varied ecological habitats. India has * 10.45% of global floral diversity. More than 50% of the world's plant species are endemic to 35 GBH, which once covered 15.9% of the earth's land surface and are now reduced to 2.3% (Mittermeier et al. 2011) . These hotspots harbor a large number of endemic species, which are facing an increasing threat of extinction (Hazarika et al. 2016 ). Endangered; VU: Vulnerable; LR/cd: Lower Risk-Conservation Dependent; NT: Near threatened; LC: Least concern; DD; Data deficient (Source: IUCN 2020) . 3 ) or vulnerable to extinction due to various reasons like population loss, loss of pollinators, loss of reproduction and/or seed germination capacity, habitat destruction (both natural and human-induced), over exploitation and loss of genetic variability (IUCN, 2020; Kala 2000 Kala , 2005 . In India about 11.53% of vascular plants (18, 532) , totaling about 2,142 species are red listed. Out of these 8 are extinct, 432 species are threatened (CR, EN and VU) and nearly 54 species are grouped under near threatened ( Fig. 3 ) (IUCN 2020).

Nature has bestowed India with an enormous wealth of medicinal plants, due to which the country is often referred as 'Medicinal Garden' or 'Botanical Garden' of the world (Ahmadullah and Nayar 1999) . Of 48,655 plant species documented (including virus, bacteria, algae, fungi and lichens) 9,500 species have ethno-botanical importance and 7,500 species are in medicinal use for indigenous health practices as well as modern system of medicines (Kumar et al. 2013; Sharma and Pandey 2013) . From ancient period medicinal plants have been used in all cultures as a source of medicine and its use as herbal medicine is described in numerous ancient texts. Besides being a major source of raw material for the traditional healthcare practices (Ayurveda, Siddha, Unani, Homeopathy, Naturopathy, Sowa-Rigpa and diverse area-and community-specific folk medicine) and pharmaceutical industry, also provide livelihood to a large Indian population (Kumar et al. 2015) . Indigenous and traditional systems of medicine using plants have shown potential (direct or indirect as immuneboosters) against many dreaded ailments including the recent global pandemic of COVID-19. For example Ayurveda preparations ('rasayana') with 'Ashwagandha' (Withania somnifera Dunal) can be a potential candidate for management of COVID-19, as also 'Shatavari' (Asparagus racemosus Willd.), 'Amala' (Phyllanthus emblica L. syn Embelica officinalis), 'Guduchi' [Tinospora cordifolia (Willd.) Miers], as these have immunomodulatory properties, and may have the potential to boost health and immunity to fight against SARS-CoV-2 infection (Patwardhan et al. 2020) .

In India more than 90% of medicinal plants are facing threat due to excessive and unsustainable collection, utilization, overexploitation or un-skilled harvesting (Kumari et al. 2011) . Based on global rates of plant species threatened with extinction, it is estimated that around 1,000 medicinal plant species may be under threat in different eco-systems across India (FRLHTENVIS 2016a). As per the IUCN Red List, a total of 457 species out of 2,143 species are listed under medicine for human and veterinary group (Table 1) . Of these, 73 are threatened (CR, EN, VU), 8 (NT), 1 (DD) and 366 (LC). Although there are publications enlisting threatened plants of medicinal value at state, region, national and global levels prepared by Conservation Assessment and Management Prioritization (CAMP), Botanical Survey of India (BSI) and IUCN, etc., there is no consolidated compilation at one place, to get an accurate assessment. Therefore, in this paper an attempt has been made to review the existing information and compile an exhaustive list of threatened medicinal plants of India. This easy, one-stop-shop ready reckoner for information related to Indian threatened medicinal plant species will be beneficial especially for young researchers to strategize conservation, repatriation and use of such species. It will help not only the researchers but also policy makers in developing strategies for efficient conservation/cultivation to ensure availability of these precious resources for utilization by future generations.

At national level several institutes have assessed the threat status of medicinal plants in India (Jain and Rao 1983; Shastry 1987-1990) . During 1987-1990, a total of 602 vascular plants were listed as threatened in Red Data Book of Indian Plants, which increased to 1,255 in 2003 (Rao et al. 2003) , and 2,152 in 2020 (IUCN 2020). Over the past two decades, 14 CAMP workshops covering 17 states of India were conducted for rapid assessment of prioritized medicinal plant species of conservation concern in different states/regions of India by the Conservation Breeding Specialist Group (CBSG), India, in collaboration with Foundation for Revitalization of Local Health Traditions (FRLHT) (Fig. 4) . CAMP workshop also uses IUCN threat categories of the respective period for assigning threat status. State-wise CAMP list of threatened medicinal plants is presented in Fig. 5a -c. We compared IUCN and CAMP list of medicinal plants and observed inconsistencies in threat status reported, and also few species missing (Table 2) .

It is estimated that about 7,500 plants are used in local health traditions in most rural and tribal villages in India (Shakya 2016) . Herbal treatments are the most popular form of traditional medical system (Sarker and Nahar 2007) . The various codified Indian systems of medicine are complemented by a strong inheritance of non-codified and non-commercial living folk healthcare traditions. These folk healthcare traditions, carried from generation to generation and practiced by around one million folk practitioners are spread across 29 states, 7 union territories, 497 cities, 7,935 towns and 6,49,481 villages and nearly 140 million rural households in the country. The first effort to assess the demand and supply of medicinal plants of selected 162 species in the country was made by the National Medicinal Plant Board (NMPB) during 2001-02, through Centre for Research, Planning and Action (CERPA) (Goraya and Ved 2017) . In 2003, export potential of medicinal plants was assessed by the FRLHT through Export Import (EXIM) Bank (Goraya Barleria prionitis L. Pinus roxburghii Sarg. 

The Government of India (GoI) took due cognizance for medicinal plants since early 1990s and several activities have been undertaken to protect and conserve these species both in situ (biosphere reserves, national parks, wild life sanctuaries, sacred groves etc.) and ex situ (botanical gardens, field gene banks, seed gene banks, in vitro gene banks and cryogenebanks). For in situ conservation, of the total geographical area of India about 16.5 million ha (5.02%) is under protected areas and 70.8 million ha (21.54%) is under forests. In India, a total of 870 protected areas are earmarked which include 104 national parks, 551 wildlife sanctuaries, 127 community reserves, 88 conservation reserves (WIIENVIS 2019). Further, an estimated 100,000 -150,000 sacred groves are present in India (Kandari et al. 2014) . In addition, several other government and non-government organizations, industries, ayurvedic practitioners are also involved in conservation and cultivation of these medicinal plants (Bhattacharyya et al. 2006) .

A network of four National Gene Banks for Medicinal and Aromatic Plants (GEBMAP) were set up in 1993 at (1) ICAR-NBPGR (2) KSCSTE -JNTBGRI, (3) CSIR-CIMAP, and (4) Regional Research Laboratory (RRL) Jammu (added later) under the G-15 GEBMAP program with Department of Biotechnology (DBT), Ministry of Science and Technology, GoI, as nodal agency. This has not only given better focus and thrust especially on collection and conservation of medicinally important threatened species but also helped in consolidating the ongoing efforts in the country (Sharma and Pandey 2013; Sharma et al. 2019 Sharma et al. , 2020 . JNTBGRI herbal garden has a collection of 1,200 taxa herbals in an area of 10 acres (KSCSTE-JNTBGRI 2019). At CSIR-CIMAP, a total of 3,334 accessions in seed bank (2,476 accessions) and field genebank (868 accessions) are being maintained (Rajpurohit and Jhang 2015) .

ICAR-NBPGR is the nodal agency for all the activities introduction, collection, conservation, documentation, evaluation and distribution of plant genetic resources (PGR) in the country. It has 10 regional stations located in different agro-climatic zones of the country and the 59 National Active Germplasm Sites (NAGS) which are based at ICAR institutes (specific crops groups) and are assigned with multiplication, evaluation, conservation of active collections of germplasm and their distribution to users both at the national and international levels. In addition, several ICAR institutes, State Agricultural Universities and other stakeholders are also linked to the network (Singh et al. 2016) . The National Gene Bank of ICAR-NBPGR has four types of conservation facilities i.e., seed gene bank, cryogenebank, in vitro gene bank and field genebank. At ICAR-NBPGR, 8,071 accessions of MAPs in seed genebank, 178 accessions in in vitro genebank and 1,041 accessions in cryogenebank are being conserved (Singh and Pandey 2019; Sharma et al. 2020) .

The (Barik et al. 2018) . Under this project 115 species were reintroduced, macropropagation protocols were standardized for 106 species and micropropagation protocols were standardized for 76 species (Barik et al. 2018) .

The medicinal plant species in trade (both domestic and international) are sourced from many different agro-climatic zones in the country from the wild, and only a very small number of species are cultivated (Pareek et al. 2005; Sharma and Pandey 2013) . Besides these, there is no data documented regarding the consumption levels of botanicals by the noncodified and non-commercial folk healthcare (Table 4 ). The NMPB has developed several policies, strategies and programs for conservation, proper harvesting, cost-effective cultivation, research and development, processing, marketing of raw material to promote and develop medicinal plants sector. Recently a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) has been signed between ICAR-NBPGR and NMPB on July 6, 2020 for safe conservation of Medicinal and Aromatic Plants Genetic Resources for long-term storage at the National Gene Bank of ICAR-NBPGR (ICAR-NBPGR 2020).

In addition to national policy framework, India has also signed few international agreements:

(i) Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), an international agreement between governments which aims to ensure that international trade of wild animals and plants does not lead to any threat on their survival. There are about 5,000 species of animals and 28,000 species of plants that are protected by CITES against over-exploitation through international trade. 

Reintroduction of threatened plants is the approach of re-establishment into an area suitable for its growth or from where it has become threatened. Through microor macropropagation, such plants have to be produced in large numbers to reintroduce in nature especially. The basic idea of this approach is to establish a selfsustaining population for conservation purposes. A species is said to be 'recovered', once the factors that initially led to its listing in threatened species are remedied and protection is no longer required. This approach has been successfully applied in India as a part of conservation efforts of threatened plants i.e., Vanda coerulea Griff ex. Lindl. (Seeni and Latha 2000) , Syzygium travancorium Gamble (Anand 2003), Decalpis arayalpathra J. Joseph & V. Chandrasekaran, Mahonia leschenaultia (Wallich ex Wight & Arnott) Takeda = Berberis napaulensis, Heracleum candolleanum (WT. & ARN.) GAMBLE, Calophyllum apetalum Willd. and Blepharistemma serratum (Densst.) Suresh = Blepharistemma membranifolia (Krishnan et al. 2011) , Ceropegia fantastica Sedgtvick (Ravikanth et al. 2018) . In recent years, the DBT has initiated a several species-specific recovery programmes targeting 156 highly threatened species of the country during the past three decades. These species belong to 101 genera and 64 families, and comprise herbs (50), trees (42), orchids (24), shrubs (14), climbers (14) Hence, it is urgently required to regroup and clearly demarcate the medicinal plants. • As many projects have been completed in the past two decades, a database should be prepared at national level, with significant outcomes of the projects. Duplication of work may be avoided and it would help to identify research gap. • Instead of several projects in parts, a meganetwork project needs to be carried out for ex situ conservation of medicinal plants. As many botanical gardens are being established, but maintaining in botanical gardens/field gene banks is a risky approach, costly affair and more chances of loss of crops due to climate change, pests, diseases and natural calamities. Hence, seed conservation/ in vitro conservation/ cryopreservation may be used for long-term safe conservation.

• Large diversity of any crop is essential for crop improvement, so emphasis may be given that entire genetic diversity of priority medicinal plants are conserved. • Though India has taken extensive activities to conserve medicinal plants, the collections remain fragmented. There is need for establishment of long-term conservation strategies which are both sustainable and accessible. The ICAR-NBPGR has been conserving all diversity in agri-horticultural crops, where it is mandatory to obtain a national identity-indigenous collection (IC) number before release of any varieties. Similarly for medicinal plants, there is need to follow similar system by all Institutes across India. Recent MOU between ICAR-NBPGR is one such step to enhance focus on conservation of this important group of plants. • All germplasm with relevant passport information must be conserved in National Gene Bank (seed genebank/in vitro/field genebanks) with a back up duplicate set at regional/Institute level, to not only ensure sustainable availability of diversity for use but also safeguarding threatened medicinal plants for future generations and future unforeseeable diseases/pandemics.

This paper provides, an easy, updated, ready-to-use guide for information for Indian threatened medicinal plant species, as designated by Indian and global agencies and conservation efforts. Further, online access to data is subject to availability of internet access. Consolidated offline information, as provided in this paper, is often required by students, teachers, policy makers etc., as a ready reckoner. This will help not only the researchers but also policy makers in developing strategies for efficient conservation/cultivation to ensure availability of these precious resources for utilization by future generations. feedback and editorial inputs. All authors have reviewed, edited and approved the manuscript.

Funding No funding.

Conflict of interest The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

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Aquilaria malaccensis Lam.,Cinnamomum aromaticum Nees = C. cassia (L.) J.Presl., Dalbergia pinnata var. acaciifolia (Dalzell) Thoth., Hydnocarpus kurzii (King) Warb., Jasminum wengeri C.E.C.Fisch., Mantisia wengeri C. E Author contributions Gowthami R and Neelam Sharma conceived the idea, gathered information and wrote the draft. Ruchira Pandey and Anuradha Agrawal provided constructive