Yusuf L Henuk
University of Sumatera Utara, Indonesia
Title: Traditional medicine used medicinal plants and their roles - in Indonesia
Biography
Biography: Yusuf L Henuk
Abstract
Indonesia’s biodiversity is ranked 3rd after Brazil and Zaire. It is home to 30,000 out of 40,000 medicinal herbal plants in the world. Medicinal plants or known in Indonesia as “Tanaman Biofarmaka” are defined as plant which are useful for traditional medicine. It is consumed from part of the plant, either in the form of leaf, fruit, tuber or root. The roles of medicinal plants as traditional medicine in Indonesia has always been a part of culture that has been passed down from generation to generation. By trial-and-error, the country’s early inhabitants learned how to distinguish useful plants with beneficial effects from those that were either toxic or non-active used as traditional medicine. They picked, kept and used medicinal plants to satisfy their basic needs and even experimented on combinations of plants or processing methods to gain optimal results. Throughout the centuries, Indonesia’s indigenous people developed traditional medicines from plants identified by their forefathers for curing illnesses and keeping their health. In general, there are about 30,000 species of medicinal plants owned by Indonesia, and potentially to develop herbal products which have equal quality with modern medicines. Currently, there are 15 important type of medicines plants and herbs in Indonesia. They are ginger, galangal, east Indian galangal, turmeric, zingiber aromaticum, Java turmeric, black turmeric, Chinese keys, sweet root/calamus, Java cardamom, Indian mulberry, phaleria macrocarpa, verbenanceae, king of bitter, and aloevera. These type of medicinal plants can be divided into two groups: rhizome and non-rhizome. There are three provinces known as the main producer of medicinal plants used for traditional medicine in Indonesia. In conclusion, medicinal plants and herbs in Indonesia used as traditional medicine has also contributed significantly in supporting the national economy, availability of food products, health and cosmetics, trades, construction of gross domestic product and absorption of worker.
