86 Fisher came to the same conclusion as Kaasinen and Ahlberg (2010) and IUCN CEC (2009), which were focused on all organism groups. Compared to many other countries, Finland is sparsely populated. In Finland, there are so-called everyman’s rights: all citizens are allowed to walk on woods, and pick berries, leaves of wild herbs and mushrooms, regardless of who is the owner of the forest. There are hundreds of years of traditions of picking and using berries and mushrooms from nature. In the 19th century, the first thorough Finnish Flora (Lönnrot 1860) contained information on how to use wild plants for food. At that time Finland was a poor agricultural country, in which famine was common. Some wild herbs have been used commonly, others have been used more rarely. In Finland, knowledge and interest on the use of native wild herbs has been increasing since the Second World War, originally because of lack of healthy food during war time (Rautavaara 1942 and 1977). Nowadays, in USA, the UK and in many other developed countries, use of wild herbs is a healthy fashion that promotes sustainable development, sustainable use of biodiversity. In Finland local species and ecosystems have been researched from the 17th century and intensively over 200 years. The region of RCE Espoo is no exception. Traditional knowledge and use of species like wild plants, trees etc. has been collected long before this field of research was called ethnobiology. According to modern science, some folk knowledge around this issue are sound, while some are dangerous. From the viewpoint of modern science, traditional knowledge ought to be taken as hypotheses. Some of the claims, at least part of them, may be correct according to modern science, but some may be damaging for human health. For example, in Japan traditional knowledge supports the consumption of young stems of Pteridium aquilinum (bracken or common bracken). Pteridium is a species of fern occurring throughout the northern hemisphere. The plant contains the carcinogenic compound ptaquiloside and Japan, where the young stems are used as a vegetable, now has one of the highest stomach cancer rates in the world (Evans & al. 1971 and Gomes & al. 2011) In the Finnish National Core Curricula (2004), for grades 1 to 6, implemented also in Espoo, one of the main educational objectives in biology is to investigate local 12 species and local ecosystems and to learn about them. NatureGate online is widely used in Finland for species identification. NatureGate is in Finnish and is translated at least partly in seven other languages, English included. In Figures 1 and 2, there are two photos of how NatureGate is used at schools. Project Activities Local species identification, conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity and ecosystem services is part of the lifelong learning and teaching vision of RCE Espoo. There are plenty of immigrants in Espoo and it is important to explicate the traditional knowledge of both natives and immigrants. There have been lethal misunderstandings around which mushrooms are edible in Finland and which are not because some inedible mushrooms look similar to those which are edible in South Asia. In the future, NatureGate will publish an interactive, online identification tool for Northern European mushrooms, both edible and toxic. In June 2012 a mobile Apps versions for iPhone and Android phones were launched officially. NatureGate will Monitori ng, docume ntation, pr otection, and edu cation Figure 1 Pupils of Mahnala Environmental School using NatureGate to identify a wild flower. (Photo, Courtesy of Ms. Annukka Alppi) Figure 2 A screen shot showing an example of type of self-instructional views and icons that NatureGate uses to promote easy, rapid, and interactive use of its patented system and method for species identification.
Traditional Knowledge and Biodiversity
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