Pt. Govind Ballabh Pant Memorial Lecture - XI Medicinal Plants for ...

of the following:- great biodiversity and abundance of flora- variety of geographical climatic conditions most exotic medicinal plantscan be grown here- Indian systems of medicine dwell heavily on medicinal plants- long tradition of phytochemical research and scientific cultivation ofmedicinal plants- well developed pharmaceutical industry- rapidly growing phytochemical and herbal drug industryIndia is thus in a vantage position to exploit this source both for meeting the domestic demand for drugsas also for export.Medicinal plants continue to be an important resource material for therapeutic agentsboth in developed and developing countries 4-7 . The Figure A shows the medicinal plantsresource and better utilization of traditional systems of medicine. India is among thetwelve leading biodiversity centres of the world, harbouring nearly 45,000 plant speciesin 16 agroclimatic and ten vegetative zones. The Indian population is known to haveused plants in health care regimens for over 5000 years. Nearly 70% of our populationis dependent on traditional plant based medicines. Over 53 million tribal people of 550tribal communities inhabit the Indian subcontinent and are reported to use around 7500species of plants for medicinal purposes.12