Indigenous Knowledge, Belief and Practice of Wild Plants among the Meru of Kenya
Alfreda Kajira Ibui conducted PhD research in ethno-botany in Kenya on Indigenous Knowledge, Belief and Practice of Wild Plants among the Meru of Kenya: Past and Present Human-Plant Relations in East Africa.
Embarking on the premise that Humankind has evolved largely from the wild plants for food and medication since prehistory. Kenya for instance has been named the ‘Cradle of Humankind’ due to the many findings by the Leakey family, confirming that most of our early ancestors were gatherers. While this could be seen as a unique phenomenon of Africa’s past on the basis of recent palaeo-ethnobotanical research in West Kenya, other studies similarly reveal that many communities in Kenya have depended for many generations on wild plants.
The Meru, a community living on the Eastern slopes of Mt. Kenya, bears witness to this fact where plants have been used in many ways such as in medicine, food, material, social, fuel, environmental, non-vertebrate poisons and as bee plants.
A specific model adopted accordingly by the Leiden Ethnosystems and Developments Programme (LEAD) of Leiden University has helped to look into the visible and invisible factors which influence the communities in their daily use of wild plants. The result of the analysis of quantitative data indicate that several factors have with strong significant correlations which powerfully influence human knowledge and use of their wild plants. This has culminated into the construction of a working model for this region, and further paved the way to understanding the implications which result from the study and analysis of wild plants use behaviour in Meru.
Alfreda Kajira Ibui was granted a PhD Degree at Leiden University on 14 November 2007 by her Promotores: Prof.Dr. L.J. Slikkerveer and Prof.Dr. R.E. Leakey. The PhD Committee included Prof.Dr. L.J. Slikkerveer (promotor), Prof.Dr. R.E. Leakey (promotor), Prof. Dr. V.H. Heywood (University of Reading, UK), Prof. Dr. K.R. Libbenga, Prof. Dr. P. Baas, Prof. Dr. R.A.M. Bedaux, Dr. C. Lionis (University of Crete).
Alfreda Kajira Ibui, Indigenous Knowledge, Belief and Practice of Wild Plants among the Meru of Kenya. PhD Dissertation, Leiden University, LEAD Studies No. 3, xxv + 327 pp. IlI, 2007.