Parks and Wildlife
Commission of the Northern Territory
The quantity and quality of works
produced by Glenn Wightman and his
colleagues have set a standard that many
future ethnobotanical projects will try
to emulate. Their approach has been so
successful that they are having
difficulty finding time and resources to
assist all the Aboriginal people who
contact the Parks and Wildlife Commission
for help in perpetuating traditional
plant and animal use. /GJM
The Ethnobiology Project of the Parks
and Wildlife Commission of the Northern
Territory has been working with
Aboriginal peoples of the Top End of the
Northern Territory since 1986. This
project, at the request of Aboriginal
elders, aims to assist Aboriginal
language groups to record and conserve
traditional plant knowledge for future
generations.
Based on the results of fieldwork with
elders of various communities, a series
of Northern Territory Botanical Bulletins
relating to individual language groups
has been published. The Bulletins, which
cover 12 languages thus far, record
traditional plant knowledge and present
it in a format that is suitable for young
Aboriginal people to learn about
traditional culture in their contemporary
school curriculum. A Bulletin relating to
Sundanese ethnobotany has also been
produced in conjunction with the
Indonesian Botanic Gardens.
The Ethnobiology Project aims to raise
public awareness and understanding of
traditional plant knowledge. Self-guided
Aboriginal plant use walks have been
developed at the Darwin Botanic Gardens.
Additional materials produced include a
series of plant use posters, the books
Traditional Bush Medicines - an
Aboriginal Pharmacopoeia and Traditional
Aboriginal Medicines in the Northern
Territory of Australia and illustrated
plant identification kits on Desert Bush
Tucker (non-domesticated edible plants
and animals), Bush Medicine and Jawoyn
plant use.
‘The stimulus for the
preparation of this book came from
the Ngarinyman people. In particular
it was the desire of the senior clan
members to record in a permanent
format the ethnobotanical aspects of
their traditional culture. The
Ngarinyman people recognize that due
to disruptions to traditional living
and learning patterns it is necessary
to adapt various aspects of their
culture to suit contemporary learning
situations. Thus it was determined to
record the traditional Ngarinyman
names and uses of plants in a booklet
which would conserve this knowledge
and thus make it available for future
generations.The desire to record
various aspects of traditional
Aboriginal culture before they are
lost has been expressed by senior
Aboriginal people in various parts of
the Northern Territory.’Smith,
N., B. Wididburu, R.N. Harrington and
G. Wightman. 1993. Ngarinyman
Ethnobotany: Aboriginal Plant Use
From The Victoria River Area,
Northern Australia. Northern
Territory Botanical Bulletin No. 16.
Palmerston, Conservation Commission
of the Northern Territory.
Smith,
N., B. Wididburu, R.N. Harrington and
G. Wightman. 1993. Ngarinyman
Ethnobotany: Aboriginal Plant Use
From The Victoria River Area,
Northern Australia. Northern
Territory Botanical Bulletin No. 16.
Palmerston, Conservation Commission
of the Northern Territory.
CONTACTS
- Glenn
Wightman, Ethnobiology Project,
Parks and Wildlife Commission of
the Northern Territory, P.O. Box
496, Palmerston, N.T. 0831,
Australia; Tel. +61.8.89994513,
Fax +61.8.89323849
 Of the
over 6000 languages known to
exist in the world today, some
260 are considered to be endemic
to Australia. |
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Protected
Areas and Wildlife Bureau
After years of high rates of
deforestation and environmental
degradation, the Philippines –
thanks in part to the people power
movement of the 1980s – has become a
hotbed of grassroots efforts to protect
and manage remaining forests. This spirit
of innovation has now spread to many
government agencies, including the DENR.
/GJM
In the Philippines, the Department of
Environment and Natural Resources (DENR)
is the primary government agency
responsible for the conservation,
management, development and proper use of
the environment and natural resources. It
is responsible for the licensing and
regulation of all natural resources in
order to ensure equitable sharing of any
benefits for the welfare of the present
and future generations of the
Philippines. The Protected Areas and
Wildlife Bureau (PAWB) is one of the many
offices under the Department which aim to
fulfill DENR’s mission. It
initiates, pursues, and promotes the
conservation of biological diversity and
protected areas to safeguard the life
support system fundamental for
sustainable development. The Bureau
encourages dynamic participation of all
sectors in the effective management of
biological resources and promotes the
development of a well-motivated
citizenry.
PAWB has been using folk media and an
outreach program as tools to teach
sustainable development and biodiversity
in schools and communities near protected
areas. Under the Dalaw-Turo (‘School
Visits’) Nature Conservation and
Awareness Outreach Program, PAWB staff
have been training DENR field extension
personnel and information officers around
the country in the use of various
non-formal environmental education
teaching methodologies since 1992.
The project involves six days of
training in protected areas on the use
and development of various Dalaw-Turo
methodologies such as street theater,
environmental games, creative workshops,
nature interpretation strategies, group
discussion and lectures. The participants
are given hands-on practical experience
by visiting five schools and two
communities to carry out their
educational action plans under
observation by PAWB trainers. After final
revisions, the participants return to
their work areas with a Dalaw-Turo action
plan to be implemented in their own
regional program.
The immediate goal of PAWB is to
ensure that in every region of the
country with a protected area, there is a
team which is undertaking Dalaw-Turo. As
the DENR network becomes established,
PAWB hopes to respond to the many
requests that are received from teachers
and NGOs for the same type of training
and extension work.
‘A typical Dalaw-Turo
lasts two hours, takes place during
the school day, and is performed for
70 children in grades 4 through 6.
The first hour might include a skit,
a short talk, a game, and
role-playing about biodiversity in
their area. During the second hour,
the children divide into small
groups. They are encouraged to
express their feelings about their
local environment and then draw a
picture, write a poem, or otherwise
create some way of expressing their
feelings. Their work is displayed in
the school, published in a
newsletter, or otherwise shared with
their families and other students.
The project evaluates student
learning at three stages. Students
are surveyed one month before the
school visits to determine their
existing environmental knowledge.
After the school visits, the students
are evaluated to assess the immediate
impact of the project.
Finally, three months later, a
“post-evaluation” monitors
longer-term changes in the
students’ attitudes about the
environment.’
Anonymous.
1996. Folk art and environmental
education: communicating creatively
in the Philippines. Human Nature
1(1):3.
CONTACTS
Ma.
Roscela Pamela S. Poyatos,
Project Leader, Dalaw-Turo Nature
Conservation and Awareness
Outreach Program, Protected Areas
and Wildlife Bureau, Department
of Environment and Natural
Resources, Quezon Avenue, Quezon
City, Philippines; Tel.
+63.2.9246031 to 9246035,Fax
+63.2.9240109
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Common
Ground
Common Ground is an innovative and
highly effective organization. Through
its original projects and ideas, it has
made an invaluable contribution towards
raising awareness of the value of
diversity in nature, culture and place.
Common Ground’s role as a catalyst
has enabled it to reach a very large
audience despite its small size. /ALH
Common Ground is a charity that
encourages local people to value and
enjoy their own familiar surroundings and
to create a popular culture of caring for
nature. Founded in 1983, it builds links
between people and organizations, acting
as a catalyst and mentor. Common Ground
works in England, but many of the issues
which it seeks to address are universal
and some of its projects and initiatives
are being copied and adapted in other
parts of the world.
The Parish Maps project encourages
people to share, record and act upon
information about their locality as a
first step to becoming involved in its
care. The project was launched in 1987,
and since then hundreds of maps have been
drawn by artists, parish councils,
schools, civic societies, women’s
groups and environmental organizations.
In the process of creating a map of their
parish, many people have been stimulated
to consider what they value about their
area and how they would like it to be.
Save our Orchards is a project on
genetic diversity and the importance of
keeping knowledge and practice alive in
their place of origin. Although the
orchard is a rich example of
Britain’s cultural landscape, about
a third have been lost since 1960. With
the loss of an orchard goes the loss of
landscape richness, knowledge of local
recipes, songs, customs, cider-making,
storage buildings and wildlife, as well
as wisdom about trees and growing food.
There are thousands of varieties of
apples and other orchard fruits many of
which are particular to a locality;
however, only a handful are widely known
and used. Common Ground is working to
excite people into finding, growing and
using local fruits. It has produced
pamphlets, exhibitions and articles and
an Apple Map of Britain. Common Ground
promotes community orchards and many are
now being created and conserved by local
communities and schools in both cities
and the countryside. The apple has proved
a rich symbol of the physical, cultural
and genetic diversity which is at risk.
Every year since 1990, Apple Day (October
21st) has been dedicated to demonstrating
the variety of apples available and the
richness of their associated culture and
environment. Thousands of people are
involved in hundreds of events which they
run themselves.Common Ground has
initiated Tree Dressing Day, drawing on
traditions from across the world. Each
year, in the first weekend in December,
people gather to decorate a tree in a
public place, and to sing, dance and tell
stories. Trees have been venerated for
millennia, and in reinventing this
traditional practice, local people draw
attention to the trees which they have
been taking for granted and motivate each
other to look after them.
‘These kinds of
traditions – rhymes, songs,
rituals – provide an essential
link with our history, playing us
tantalising hints of the lives of our
forebears. They remind us that though
much may have changed, a good deal of
it for the better, there are still
common elements which time cannot
erode. The simple pleasures in life
are not so very different now –
a bite of a crisp, juicy apple, apple
pie with cream, a stroll through a
blossoming apple orchard, the
changing seasons. These are things
that we can share and celebrate with
the generations that came before us
...In many parts of the country it
was considered lucky to leave an
apple or two either on the ground or
on the tree after the harvest, to
keep any wandering spirits happy. In
Yorkshire a small apple was left as a
propitiating gift and care was taken
to thank the tree for its fruit. In
other parts of the country the small
or damaged apples were left on the
tree for the birds, who were the
guardian spirits. These apples were
thought to be the property of the
fairy folk, the pixie harvest.'
Anonymous.
1994. Apple Games and Customs.
London, Common Ground.
CONTACTS
- Sue
Clifford, Common Ground, Seven
Dials Warehouse, 44 Earlham
Street, London WC2H 9LA, UK; Tel.
+44.171.3793109, Fax
+44.171.8365741
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