Economic Botany
Economic Botany:-
Introduction:-
> There are three basic needs in the life of a man viz. food, dothing and shelter.
> Pre-historic man could comfortablemeet out theserequirements from the plant kingdom.
> Modem man has increased these requirements many times due to which his lifestyle is comparatively becoming complex and stressful.
> Actually plant kingdom is a very special world of living beings which is able to harvest the inexhaustible radiation energy of the Sun and store it in the form of organic substances.
> All the three basic requirements of a man are met out in various forms and in sufficient quan1ities as food ma1erials, fibres and wood by the plants.
Definition:-
> Those plants from which useful products are obtained by the man areconsidered aseconomically useful plants.
> Study of useful plants and their products is called Economic Botany.
Under economic botany various types of useful plants and their products are studied.
> Some such products are cereaJs, pulses, fruits, vegetables, spices, edible oil, mc?icines. fibres, tea and coffee, rubber, gums, resins, paper, starch and sugars, alcohol i c, beverages, timber and fuel food, furnitories, masticatories and narcotic substances, fodder, ornamental plants, essential oils (volatile oils) and biopesticides etc.
> By looking at this list of useful plant products one can easily estimate that actually the plant community is the real wealth of a nation.
> The subject of economic botany becomes more diversity among the plant kingdom is recorded. This is the reason that the economic prosperily of our country is based on agriculture.