The provision of declaring Biodiversity Heritage Sites (BHS) in the National Biodiversity Act 2002 provides an opportunity to give recognition to the community initiatives vis-a-vis the institution of the sacred natural sites (SNS). In brief, the salient feature of the Biodiversity Act 2002, as relates to the BHS, is that the state government in consultation with the local bodies may notify in official gazette, biodiversity rich areas, including the SNS as BHS.

Rain water use efficiency (RWUE) is the assessment of a rainfed cropping system’s capacity to convert water into plant biomass or grain. Comparison of RWUE of various crops grown under traditional tribal farming system and its performance in drought year will give an insight for prioritization of crops grown in rainfed tribal areas. A study was undertaken in a tribal watershed of Koraput district to prioritize the commonly grown crops based on RWUE and their comparative performance during water stress condition.

Effective wildlife conservation requires understanding and integration of cultural values and practices among communities within wildlife range areas. In Africa, elephants still roam outside protected areas and frequently interact with local people. Maasai-land in East Africa has a considerable elephant population, estimated to number 20,000 individuals, yet there is little understanding of the cultural values and perception of elephants among the Maasai people.

Indigenous Technical Knowledge has been the key rescuer of the fishers and common people of Dhemaji district of Assam, India from frequent floods in the region every year. They utilize the existing resources with a sustainable eco-friendly approach towards disaster management and exploration of fisheries resources and co-exist with the usual floods in the region. This study was conducted in the region through PRA after interviewing 110 fishers of three most flood-prone development blocks of the district with the help of an interview questionnaire.

Despite the increasing acceptance of traditional medicines in peri-urban areas in South Africa, this rich indigenous knowledge is not adequately documented. Therefore, an ethnobotanical study was undertaken to document medicinal plants grown and maintained in per-urban domestic gardens in the Capricorn District, Limpopo Province. Semi-structured interviews, observation and guided walks with 62 participants were employed to obtain ethnobotanical data on medicinal plants grown and maintained in peri-urban domestic gardens.

In view of increasing threat of climate change, extreme whether conditions, and recent financial crisis there has been a concern for augmenting agriculture and food supply to growing population, particularly to the rural areas. Fortunately the communities living near biodiversity rich areas depend on wide variety of plant resources for their survival; selected species have high potential for food supply in near future.

Transhumance system of livelihood of the Brokpa pastoral nomads inhabiting in the yak tracts of Arunachal Pradesh with special emphasis on climate change adaptation was assessed in the present study. A representative sample of the 240 Brokpa pastoral nomads from all the yak rearing tracts of Arunachal Pradesh was selected randomly. The Brokpa pastoral nomads mainly depend upon livestock, like yak, yak-cattle hybrid etc, rearing for their livelihood. They perceived that season cycle has been changed in lower and mid altitude.

Traditional architectural principles always respected nature, and was climate conscious, user-friendly, reflected the culture and tradition of the community at large and most important was contextual. Various parameters such as geographical location, climatic conditions, occupation, culture and tradition of the society/ community decide these principles in a specific set up and make the structures sustainable in all respect.

Monkey jack (Artocarpus gomenzianus Wall.ex Trecul) an underutilized edible and medicinal plant of Central Western Ghats has been studied for their distribution, harvesting, morphology and juice yield, processing, preservation and powder yield at various regions of Central Western Ghats. The fruits showed variation with respect to morphology, juice yield, powder yield, proximates and nutritive value and also elemental components. The comparative study with RDA value confirms the food supplements properties of monkey jack.

This article published in the Indian Journal of Traditional Knowledge documents the indigenous practices used by soybean farmers of Chindwara district, Madhya Pradesh, India.