A note on an important edible, rare and the famine food plant of Indian Thar Desert: Glossonema varians (Stocks) Benth.
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NOTES ON NEGLECTED AND UNDERUTILIZED CROPS
A note on an important edible, rare and the famine food plant of Indian Thar Desert: Glossonema varians (Stocks) Benth. ex Hook.f Suman Parihar
. N. K. Dwivedi
Received: 11 December 2019 / Accepted: 28 July 2020 Ó Springer Nature B.V. 2020
Abstract Glossonema varians is a medicinally important, rare, endemic and edible plant species of Thar Desert. Glossonema varians is a perennial herb and well adapted to the arid and semi arid region of the Indian Desert. The plant is used as famine food at the time of food scarcity and local people also used it as fodder. The plant is under rare category due to its large scale harvesting from wild as it is used extensively by the industries and the local population as energy tonic and other medicinal uses. Due to habitat destruction and increased anthropogenic activities, the natural propagation of plant is limited and now found only in the some pockets of Jaisalmer District, Rajasthan. Biotechnological tools can play important role in conservation, propagation and improvement of plant genetic resources of this rare plant species. Present manuscript has summarized the information regarding the occurrence, botanical description, medicinal uses, conservation strategies and scope of research in G. varians.
S. Parihar (&) Biotechnology Laboratory, Department of Botany, Centre for Advanced Studies, JNV University, Jodhpur, Rajasthan 342005, India e-mail: [email protected] N. K. Dwivedi NBPGR, Regional Station, KAU, Vellanikkara, Thrissur, Kerala 680656, India
Keywords Endemic Edible Famine food Glossonema varians Rare Thar Desert
Introduction Rajasthan, the largest state of India, occupies nearly 3, 42, 239 km2 in North-Western region i.e. 10.4% of the total area of the country. It is situated between 23°300 and 30°120 N latitude and 69°300 and 78°170 E longitude. The altitude of the land differs from 214 to 1375 m. The western three-fifth part of the state is sandy plain called Maroosthali in Hindi (meaning region of death), covered by sand-dunes of various types, sizes and alignment. The Thar Desert is approximately 10,000 years old only. It is enclosed by the rocky Aravalli range in the East which runs across the Rajasthan state for approximately 692 kilometres. Physiographically it is the eastern extension of the Vast Sahara/Thar Desert (Allen and Hoekstra 1992).The climate is extreme, the annual temperature can range from near freezing to more than 50 °C during the summer. The entire rainfall is concentrated during July–September. The soil and vegetation of the state varies with its wide ranging topography of arid plains. The soil is sandy and sandyloam having very low water retention capacity, high alkalinity and soluble salt concentration. The annual rainfall varies from 200 to 400 mm with coefficient of
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Genet Resour Crop Evol Fig. 1 Map of Rajasthan, India showing the collection site of Glossonema varians
variation of 40–60%, relative humidity is low and wind vel
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