V SREERAJ THIRUVANANTHAPURAM

in a bid to revitalise local health traditions and dietary habits, the Tropical Botanic Garden and Research Institute ( tbgri ) in Palode, Tiruvananthapuram, has started a grassroots-level programme called "Herbs for all, Health for all, by 2000 ad' . By recognising and scientifically evaluating and validating these knowledge systems, the project aims at making people more self-reliant and selective in their approach to health and nutrition. It also seeks to promote the conservation of medicinal plants and the concept of home remedy.

According to P Pushpangadan, the director of the tbgri , "For the past few decades, the trend has been to adopt dietary habits and health practices that are unhealthy and unscientific. Meanwhile, our time-tested and precious local traditions have been neglected, something that cannot be justified on the basis of proper scientific evaluation. As a result of this, the health of the people has suffered, a fact proved by the growing number of cases exhibiting deficiency symptoms and physiological disorders.'

The programme places special emphasis on primary health care. Pushpangadan strongly criticizes the practice of administering antibiotics to children as it severely affects their nervous systems. "A number of remedies available in the traditional systems for mild problems like fever, cold and gastro-intestinal disorders do not produce any side-effects,' says Vinodkumar, a junior scientific assistant in the ethnomedicine and ethnopharmacology division of the tbgri . According to Vinodkumar, people in rural areas relied entirely on herbal remedies till a few decades back. Only at times of grave danger did they approach practitioners of modern medicine.

The programme, currently in its second phase, was started in November, 1995. The first phase covered four villages in Thiruvananthapuram district