Ethnobotanical Studies on Wild Edible Fruits in Southern Yunnan: Folk Names; Nutritional Value and Uses 1
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ETHNOBOTANICAL STUDIES ON WILD EDIBLE FRUITS IN SOUTHERN YUNNAN: FOLK NAMES; NUTRITIONAL VALUE AND USES 1 CHEN JIN, SU YIN-CHUN, CHEN GuI-QrN, AND WANG WEN-DUN Chen Jin; Su Yin-Chun, Chen Gui-Qin, and Wang Wen-Dun (Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden, the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Mengla County, Yunnan Province 666303, the People's Republic of China). ETHNOBOTANICALSTUDIES ON WILDEDIBLE FRUITS IN SOUTHERN YUNNAN: FOLK NAMES; NUTRITIONALVALUE AND USES. Economic Botany 53(1):2-14, 1999. The climate of Yunnan province ranges from humid tropical to subtropical. Wild edible fruits form an important dietary component of the ethnic groups in the south of Yunnan Province, which is famous for its rich diversity in both biological resources and ethnic culture, and A list of 123 different fruits is presented, which includes the folk names used by Dai, Hani, Bulang, Jinuo, and others; distribution; uses and the nutritional contents of 52 different species (edible part percentage, moisture, total sugar, titratable acid, vitamin C, crude fat, crude fiber, starch, and soluble tannin). ETHNOBOTANISCHE STUDIEN (IBER NATIVE, EI~BARE FROCHTE IM SUDLICHEN YUNNAN: NAMEN DER LOKALEN BEV()LKERUNG; WERT FUR DIE ERN,g,HRUNG UND IHR NUTZEN. Dieses Papier behandelt die wilden, eflbaren Friichte, welche yon den ethnischen Gruppen im Siiden der Yunnan Provinz genutzt werden. Diese Region in China ist gut bekannt fiir ihre hohe Diversitiit in den Bereichen biologische Ressourcen und ethnologische Kultur. Das Klima variiert yon tropisch humid bis subtropisch. Es wird ein Liste mit 123 verschiedenen Friichten vorgestellt, welche die Namen der lokalen Bev61kerung beinhaltet (wie die der Dai, Hanim, Bulang, Jinuo etc.), ebenso Ver- teilung und Gebrauchsart. Auflerdem werden zu 52 Arten Angaben iiber die ern?ihrungsphy- siologischen Zusammensetzung gemacht (eflbarer Teil in Gewichtsprozent, Wassergehalt, Zuck- ergehalt, tritierbare Siiuren, Vitamin C-Gehalt, Fettgehalt, Ballaststoffgehalt, Stiirkegehalt, lOs- licher Tanningehalt). Key Words: China; southern Yunnan; wild edible fruits; ethnobany; nutritional contents. Southern Yunnan is situated on the great China's richest diversity in biological resources southward slope of the Qingzang (Tibet) Pla- as well. The total area is about 80 000 km2; it teau, the roof of the world, near to both the In- makes up only about 1/120 of the whole coun- dian Ocean and the Pacific Ocean. In the sum- try, but possesses about one fourth of the flora mer time the southwest monsoon brings plentiful of China, i.e., about 7500 vascular plants in- moisture into this region, while in winter the cluding about 6000 native species (Xu 1987). high mountain ranges and plateau in the north- The tropics of Yunnan is also famous for its ern part keep away the cold currents. So the cli- very rich diversity of ethnic groups. More than mate in this area is tropical and subtropical, 20 different groups live in this area, of which characterized by moist warm winters, and heat about nine are known to have inhabited this area and water resources favorable for the evolution since ancient time (Ma 1983). Different groups and development of tropical forest. Southern have gathered medicinal herbs, fruits, vegeta- Yunnan has long been ranked as "the green is- bles, and the like from the forests and have ac- land in the desert belt around the tropic of Can- cumulated rich indigenous knowledge of the for- cer," and is the only place where large-scale est. original tropical forests still exist in China. It has Ethnobotanical studies in this area have been carried on since the 1960s (Pei 1982), as have ~Received 2 May 1996; resubmitted; accepted 14 studies on ethnoecology (Pei 1985), ethnotax- April 1998. onomy (Xu and Huang 1991) and indigenous Economic Botany 53(1) pp. 2-14. 1999 1999 by The New York Botanical Garden Press, Bronx, NY 10458-5126 U.S.A. 1999] JIN ET AL.: WILD FRUITS IN YUNNAN 3 medicine (Zhau and Zhou 1985). Wild edible METHODS fruits consumed by local people, in comparison, Field trips were conducted during 1989-1992. have been in somewhat neglected. The major Xishuangbanna were selected for more detailed aim of our study is to try to provide information treatment. A total of 15 trips, 7-10 days each on this aspect. time, has been carried out. During two trips for southeast and southwest parts of the area, 20- STUDY AREA 25 days each, we sampled several sites around Bordered by Vietnam, Laos and Myanmar, the natural reserves. Interviews with reliable villag- south of Yunnan covers 20% of total area of ers, local market observation, and plant material Yunnan province and is 90% mountainous (Xu collection have been carried out during the field 1987). trips. Typically, we invited 2-3 villagers, con- The climate in South Yunnan varies according sidered to be the most knowledgeable on local to altitude and landform. The mean annual tem- plant uses to conduct transect walks in both orig- perature varies from 16.0~ to 22.0~ decreas- inal forest and secondary forest surrounding ing by 0.5-0.7~ for each 100 m above sea level their village. During these walks ethnobotanical (Chen 1983). Rainfall in southern Yunnan is information was recorded for edible wild fruits. plentiful, varying from 1200 mm to 1800 mm, Folk names were carefully recorded during tran- while in some dry hot valleys lower than 1000 sect walks and afterwards tested in several dif- mm, and on the tops of some mountains, higher ferent sites to make sure these folk names are than 2500 mm. With the strong influence of the most commonly used by the local people. The monsoon the rainy season is from mid-May to pronunciation of the folk names were recorded October; the remaining period of the year is the based on Chinese phonetic alphabet although dry season. sometimes it was difficult to record the pronun- About 18% of the area is covered by natural ciation accurately. Samples of ripe fruits were forest (Xu 1987). The major vegetation types in analyzed in the shortest time possible, generally southern Yunnan are tropical forest and subtrop- within one week. Voucher specimens were kept ical forest. The tropical forest includes three in the herbarium in Xishuangbanna Tropical Bo- sub-types, i.e., tropical rain forest, tropical mon- tanical Garden of the Chinese Academy of Sci- soon forest and tropical savanna woody forma- ences. tions. The subtropical forest includes evergreen The methods used in the fruit analysis are as broad-leaved forest and subtropical savanna follows. The moisture content was determined woody formations (Wu 1983; Xu 1996). The by oven-drying the samples at 105~ until con- tropical and subtropical savanna woody forma- stant weight was reached (Huang 1979:11-12). tions mostly occur in the dry-hot valleys along The total content of sugars was determined by rivers that are excluded in our study. The trop- using the potassium ferricyanide titration meth- ical rainforest in this area has conspicuous char- od (Huang 1979:30-32). The total content of ti- acters of margin of tropical southeastern Asian tratable acid (free fatty acid) was determined by flora (Zhu 1994). using the Na2OH3 titration method (Cai and Ethnic groups in this area, long ettled in the Yuan 1982:29). The content of (ascorbic acid) area include the Yi, Hani, Zhuang, Dai, Wa, was measured by employing the 2,6-dichloro- Lahu, Jingpo, Bulang, Jinuo and others. The Wa indophenol titration method (Wang 1988:192- and Bulang belong to the Austro-Asiatic lan- 193). The soluble tannin was determined using guage phylum the others belong to the Sino-Ti- the following procedure: The hot water (80~ betan phylum (Ma 1983). Most of the local peo- extract of the samples was mixed with an aliquot ples in this area are distributed over large parts of Folir-Denis reagent solution (a mixture of of Indo-China and across political boundaries. Na2WOa.2H20 + H3PO4.12MoO3.xH20 + H3PO4). For example, Dai people in Xishuangbanna are The blue color which developed in the alkaline the Tai in Thailand and Laos, Shan and Khun in conditions (with the presence of Na2CO3) was north-east Myanmar, and also Tho and Nung in spectrometrically determined at 760~m (Yan northern Vietnam; the Hani(Aini) in this area are and Wang 1982:539-540). The cellulose content also to be found in North Thailand as Akha and was quantified by determining the ash-free dry in Laos as Iko (Apel 1996). weight of the residues after treating the samples 4 ECONOMIC BOTANY [VOL. 53 with 1.25% (W/V) of H2SO4 and 1.25% (W/V) FACTORS IN FRUIT SELECTION of NaOH (Yan and Wang 1982, p.335-337). The Vegetation Types and Botanical Aspects determination of total starch content followed the procedure (acid hydrolysis method) as de- The most frequently used families of wild scribed by Wang (1988). Crude fatty acid was fruits are Rosaceae (10 spp.), Moraceae (9 spp.), determined by using the Soxhlet-extraction Anacardiaceae (7 spp.), Myrtaceae (6 spp.), Gut- method (Huang 1979: 28-30). tiferae (6 spp.). The most frequently used genera are Ficus (7 spp.), Garcinia (6 spp.), Syzygium RESULTS (5 spp.), Elaeocarpus (3 spp.), Rubus (3 spp.), A total of 123 species (52 families and 82 Mangifera (3 spp.), Capparis (3 spp.) and Cal- genera) with edible fruits used by inhabitants in amus (3 spp.). southern Yunnan have been recorded. Ethnobo- About 103 species come from the original for- tanical data listed in Appendix 1 includs botan- est, i.e., 83.7% of the total 123 species, and 48 ical names, folk names, distribution, uses. Table species or 39.0%, come from secondary forests, 1 shows the nutritional value of 52 different fruit including 28 fruits belonging to both vegetation species.