ETHNOBOTANICAL STUDY OF MEDICINAL PLANTS IN CHIRO WOREDA, WEST HARARGHE ZONE OF OROMIA REGIONAL STATE, ETHIOPIA

Indigenous peoples have developed their own locality specific knowledge on plant use, management and conservation. The ethnobotanical study is important as it involves local communities in the conservation of biodiversity. Therefore, the purpose of the study was to undertake ethnobotanical investigation on medicinal plants, document indigenous knowledge on utilization, conservation and management systems used by the communities of Chiro District/ Harerghe Zone, Ethiopia. The study involved 363 informants from three kebeles, comprising traditional healers, knowledgeable elders and local user communities. Various ethnobotanical techniques were used to collect and analyse data were semi- structured interview, guided field walk, group discussion, preference raking, direct matrix ranking, fidelity level index and paired comparison with descriptive statistical analysis. A total of 34 medicinal plant species (21 from wild areas, 13 from home gardens) were collected and identified. Out of these, 27 (79.4%) species were used for the treatment of human ailments and 5 (14.7%) species to treat livestock aliments, while 2 (5.8%) species used to treat both livestock and human ailments. Herbs and shrub constituted 15 (44.11%) of the total collected medicinal plants, followed by 4 (11.76%) trees species. Oral administration of the herbal medicine is the dominant route 22 (88%), followed by smoking 3 (29.03%) in which pounding, powdering, chewing and rubbing are among reported methods of preparation. Preference ranking of 5 medicinal plants reported to treat dermal problem showed that Asparagus africanus ranked first followed by Datura stamonium. Computation of direct matrix ranking showed that Juniperus procera ranked first for being used for many purposes. In order to conserve substantial number of medicinal plants and knowledge, local people must be taught about the importance of growing medicinal plants in home gardens mixing with crops and encouraging people to protect and enclose ritual and spiritual areas with higher distribution of medicinal plants in the locality.