Medicinal plants within the context of pastoral life in the village of Pungmo, Dolpo, Nepal (original) (raw)

Background Geography and culture Dolpo is a cultural area in Nepal inhabited by the Dolpo•pa 4 (Jest 1975, Snellgrove 1992) in what is today the administrative district of Dolpa, bordering the Tibet Autonomous Region to the north, Mustang District to the east, and Jumla and Mugu Districts to the west. Part of Dolpo has been incorporated into Shey Phoksundo National Park, established in 1984 to conserve a unique trans-Himalayan ecology and biodiversity. The largest national park in Nepal, Shey Phoksundo (SPNP) covers an area of 3,555 sq.km, with a buffer zone covering a further 1,329 sq.km. The park is inhabited by about 3,000 people; some 10,000 people live in the peripheral buffer zone area. Dolpo has a strong Tibetan cultural influence, with most of its inhabitants, especially in the northern part, tracing their lineages to Tibet (Jest 1975, Snellgrove 1992, Lama et al. 2001). Upper Dolpo is culturally Tibetan, with Bonp05 and Buddhist followers. Lower Dolpo, located to the south of Phoksundo Lake, has villages that are culturally Bonpo Tibetan, such as Pungmo and Rigmo, and in the southwest villages that are a mix of Bonpo and Hindu, including Kaigaon, Hurikot, Pahada, and Tripurakot. The Kanjiroba range, which culminates at 6883m, crosses the park transversely above Lake Phoksundo, the second largest and the deepest lake in Nepal, separating the area into southern and northern portions. The southern part, lower Dolpo, is predominantly covered with temperate, sub-alpine, and alpine vegetation and has an annual precipitation of about 1,500 mm. The northern part is in the rain shadow of the Kanjiroba and Dhaulagiri ranges, and thus is a treeless, trans•Himalayan, arid. area with an annual precipitation of less than 500 mm. Changes in Dolpo lifestyle: external factors The political upheaval in the Tibetan Plateau, and the subsequent closure of the Tibetan border in 1959, have had major effects upon the local economy and livelihoods of all the northern border districts of Nepal, including Dolpa, where the Dolpo•pa had traditional rights to graze their cattle on.the Tibetan plateau (Rai and