4. Conclusion

4.1.1. Medicinal plants

The association of traditional healers was established in the late 1980s. This organisation comprises all local traditional healers. By law, all traditional healers are supposed to have a certificate that they obtain after a rigorous test conducted by the qualified traditional healers. Legally, therefore, any person who is found collecting medicinal plants without a license is in breach of the law and may be prosecuted.

The potential for traditional medicines in these country is very promising indeed because even the Ministry of Health now recognises the traditional healers to a point where in some cases people are referred to these some established healers even they do not seem to respond to modern medicines.

The major problem with this practice is that although the people who do not have the certificates are not allowed to collect, sell or be in any way involved in the traditional healing practice, there is no strict law enforcement. Consequently, many plants are threatened due to over exploitation

4.1.2. Thatching grass

Traditionally, thatching grass was used by the rural people for roofing their houses. In recent years however, most city dwellers prefer this grass for roofing instead of corrugated iron. The demand for this grass has therefore, increased dramatically. The increased bovine population has also resulted in the need for more grazing land. This has resulted in serious problems regarding the proper management of this grass in order to ensure abundance and continuous supply.

4.1.3. Mosera

The pressure on thatching grass on one hand has led to most people resorting to this grass for roofing their houses while on the other hand the demand for both brooms and hats has also increased. If this trend continues, this grass will soon be threatened.

4.1.4. Honey

The potential for honey is very good indeed. In recent years, it is not easy to find a colony of bees in the wild while the demand for honey is still very high. As it has been explained that the number of individual with hives has increased from 32 to 52 within a period of two years (i.e. from 1996 to 1998). In the country like Lesotho, where employment opportunities are very low there is no doubt that bee keeping as business has very good prospects.

It is not easy to make any sound management decisions if there is not enough raw data that can be refined into useful information. The problem, however, is that most countries do not have that capacity to do this on the regular basis. Even in cases where there is some statistics available, it is not easy for some organisations to release it for public consumption.

Perhaps a possible solution to this problem could be to establish a unit within SADC member states that would in conjunction with individual member states identify individuals, who would be responsible for collecting, storing disseminating data on a regular basis.