ABSTRACT
Abstract 200 9.1 Introduction 200 9.2 Is there a big loss of medicinal plant species in India? 200 9.3 What are the most signicant losses? 201 9.4 What impact will the decline of these plants have? 201 9.5 Are these losses because of climate change or
because of over-extraction? 202 9.6 Climate change 202
The climate change challenge for plants 203 Meeting the challenge: Important plant areas 203 Endan gering medicinal plants advertisement 204 Climate change recognised as one of the greatest
challenges 204 Medicinal and aromatic plants and climate change 204 Medicinal and aromatic plants in other threatened
regions 206 Wide spread effects of climate change on medicinal
and aromatic plants 207 Shifts in phenology 207 The impact of extreme weather events 208
The United Nations declared 2010 as the Year of Biodiversity to encourage nations to conserve their plant and animal species. The Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) was signed more than a decade ago, but species continue to disappear worldwide at a rapid rate. Local communities who have used medicinal plants for generations say that these species are becoming hard to nd. They say climate change is a factor. The CBD embedded three main goals into the national biodiversity strategies of all countries who signed it. These were sustainable use and the fair and equitable sharing of benets of genetic resources. In respect of wild Indian medicinal plants, Article 8 of the CBD relates to in situ conservation. In particular clause 8(j) and 8(d) are very relevant to medicinal plants. However, as far as implementation is concerned much remains to be done.
