It is time to stop discounting traditional expertise and make use of this vast and valuable resource, argues Indian scientist Suman Sahai.
Science and technology have always been an important part of growth and development plans. But accepted 'scientific expertise' is Western, standardised and homogenous. From this viewpoint, the vast body of scientific expertise developed in diverse societies and cultures is discounted and ignored.
Referred to as indigenous or traditional knowledge, this is a knowledge system distilled from generations of scientific work anchored in rural and tribal communities. It is different to the Western system of empirical, lab-based science — but is equally valid and efficacious.
It is time to recognise that there are different kinds of sciences and scientific expertise, and that all of them should be used for development and problem-solving.
The knowledge that evolved
Indigenous knowledge has developed from understanding and documenting the processes in nature. An iteration of practices over time has led to products and processes that are based on sound scientific principles.
Take plant extracts for example. Observing that animals did not eat certain plants and assuming that this was because they were toxic, communities took extracts and tested them for a range of uses. Many were, and still are, used as pesticides in agriculture, in bait to catch fish or to treat maggot infestations in livestock.
Because plants differ across ecological zones, each region has developed products and uses based on their regional flora. Indigenous science is diverse, and it is efficacious in the particular context in which it is used.
Similarly, in indigenous medicine, the plants used in traditional Chinese medicine will be different to those used in India, Indonesia or Myanmar — but all these healing systems will cure many diseases effectively. Even today, almost 80 per cent of the population of some Asian and African countries rely on indigenous systems for primary healthcare. [1]
Indigenous knowledge is not a panacea, but it offers as valid a route for treatment as any other. Just as Western medicine cannot cure a common cold or many chronic diseases, traditional medicines may not be as effective as antibiotics in rapidly controlling infections.
But it has some advantages. Antibiotics lead to side effects (which could range from allergies and rashes to more serious effects like toxicity) and bacteria can ultimately become resistant to them; traditional healing is more broad-based and holistic, designed as much to prevent disease as to cure it.