Ethnobotanical study of medicinal plants in the Mechraâ Bel Ksiri region of Morocco

An ethnobotanical study of the medicinal plants was carried out in the area of Mechraâ Bel Ksiri (Region of Gharb) in order to establish a catalog of the medicinal plants containing the therapeutic uses reported by the local people. Field ethnobotanical investigations, based on 280 interviews, were conducted during two periodsin 2006 and 2007. 149 medicinal plant taxa have been identified belonging to 127 genera and 52 families, being Asteraceae, Lamiaceae, Apiaceae, Poaceae, Solanaceae and Fabaceae the six most abundant. These results also show that the leaves and seeds are the most used parts of plant and most remedies are prepared as a decoction. Metabolic disorders occupy the first place among the treated diseases with a rate of 22.65 %, followed by digestive diseases (16.02 %), genitourinary disorders (10.49 %) and skin pains (8.84 %).
These results constitute a source of very precious information for the area studied and for subsequent researches for the domains of the phytochemistry and pharmacology in order to search for new natural substance.