Medicinal flora in Egypt's hyper-arid land: Quantitative insights into distribution, diversity, and conservation status

Abstract

Background: Egypt was not immune to the climatic changes occurred worldwide, especially during the past five decades, these changes may be accompanied by changes in land use, as well as the extinction of many plant species. This review includes the current status of the Egyptian natural plant resources with special reference to distribution, diversity, and conservation status in different biogeographic regions of Egypt. It also represents baseline information for all subsequent studies related to medicinal plants in Egypt and arid regions.

Methods: Databases were reviewed to get information on the medicinal plants utilized in Egypt. The biological spectrum was determined following Raunkiaer’s system. Differentiation indices were used to describe the taxonomic degrees of divergence across the recorded species.  Besides, plant species were classified according to their used parts. Species diversity was estimated among biogeographic regions of Egypt and then analyzed using the Chao-Jaccard index. Species’ conservation status was evaluated using the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. A hierarchical cluster analysis and Principal Components Analysis were performed to classify and ordinate the reported species in nine Operation Geographical Units (OGUs), and a heatmap was used to visualize the cluster analysis.

Results: A total of 113 medicinal plant species, belonging to 49 families was documented. Brassicaceae, Fabaceae, Lamiaceae, were the families with higher contribution. In terms of species richness and diversity, the Sinai region was the highest diverse followed by the Mediterranean and Nile regions reflecting their ecological richness and diverse habitats. The least diversified regions were Gebel Uweinat and the Western Desert. Therophytes were the dominant life form, while, hydrophytes and parasites were poorly represented. Twenty Wide Range Species was recorded. The predominant plant parts used were leaves, aerial parts, and seeds. Approximately 54% of the recorded species were included in the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Most of them were classified as Least Concern, three as Data Deficient and one as Near Threatened.

Conclusions: Protecting and conserving economic medicinal plants is an urgent need, including improving knowledge about the important ecological requirements of these species, and raising awareness among all stakeholders to protect this heritage and avoid biodiversity loss.

Keywords: Arid environments, Biogeography, Climate change, Desert vegetation, Folk medicine, Threats to biodiversity