Displacement threatens local knowledge: plant foraging in a cross-cultural context in the Gomal area, NW Pakistan

In the context of human displacement, it is essential to study how local knowledge is reshaped, eroded, or transformed. This study sheds light on how wild plant reports are articulated after migration, retained, and kept; the research explores specifically the ethnobotanical knowledge linked to wild food plants of five ethnic communities, namely the Bettani, Ormur, Mehsud, and Miani populations living in the Gomal area of NW Pakistan, of which three are displaced communities. The study aims to record the knowledge of wild food plants and their use among generations in these communities. To better determine the impact of displacement, we have analysed the data along two trajectories: (a) cross-geographically comparing the recorded wild food plant reports with the available published literature in NW Pakistan and (b) conducting a cross-cultural comparison of the local plant knowledge among the considered groups (displaced ones: Mehsud, Ormur, and Powanda; autochthonous: Bettani and Miani) residing in the Gomal area. Via semi-structured interviews with a hundred study participants (twenty for each ethic group), the study revealed the use of 69 wild food taxa, showing a remarkable diversity of food uses, with Ormur and Powanda exhibiting several idiosyncratic reports. The research highlights that displacement may have disrupted potential pathways of knowledge transmission among the Mehsud, Ormur, and Powanda; however, local plant knowledge about their past environment remains part of the collective memory of these communities. Moreover, post-migration exposure to a new ecological system has become a challenge for the newcomers, necessitating adaptation to rearticulate their relationship with nature and plants. The broken paths have a profound impact on plant knowledge transmission to youngsters, as social structures and gatherings have been significantly altered or disrupted; these were the primary means of interaction between youngsters and their elders. The exposure to urbanisation compounds the issue of displacement, and the erosion of knowledge systems has come at the expense of hands-on experiences among the selected groups. Notably, the local plant nomenclature of Ormur is also highly threatened. We advocate incorporating local plant knowledge into local educational curricula, which may be crucial for the sustainability of natural knowledge and have profound impacts on mitigating the effects of socioecological change.