Knowledge of unconventional food plants in rural settlements

Abstract

Unconventional food plants (PANC) refer to all the plants that possess one or more edible parts for humans, being spontaneous or cultivated, native or exotic, which are not included in our daily menu. Family farmers, when they have understanding of the potential of these food plants, are able to diversify their usual food and cultivate them taking advantage of unproductive areas or those of low fertility. The work had as its objective to evaluate the level of knowledge of the farmers resident in rural settlements about the PANC and identify botanically the species present in the locations studied. The research took place between March and June 2019 in three settlements of land reform in Santana do Livramento, RS, with 15 key informants using as methodology sampling of the snowball type. Pre-elaborated questions were answered by the settlement farmers during the guided tour method. As a result, 20 species of PANC were identified botanically belonging to 12 different botanical families, the majority being of the Astereaceae family (38,8%), located principally in natural pastures (50%). The species of greater occurrence in the settlements researched were gorse (Baccharis trimera), buva (Conyza bonariensis), black prick (Bidens pilosa), purslane (Portulaca oleracea), the leaves of moganga pumpkin (Curcubita maxima) and caruru (Amaranthus deflexus). It was observed that the knowledge of the farmers about the PANC is restricted and based on individual beliefs and ancestral values, which was reflected in the absence of consumption of the vegetable species by those interviewed. It is considered necessary the correct botanical identification of the PANC before collecting and consuming as food, in order to avoid ingesting mistaken or toxic species.