This week, the Biosphere Reserve office delivered the second volume of the book Cultural Uses of Herbs in the Fields of Lanzarote to educational centers. With this initiative, the department is fulfilling two of the primary goals of its work: promoting basic and applied scientific research in the territory and raising environmental awareness among the young population.
The volume is now available in all school libraries on the island for consultation and application for educational purposes. On Monday, January 12, the books were distributed among the thirteen single-teacher schools on the island, during a coordination meeting of the Rural Schools Collective (CER), while on Tuesday the 13th and Wednesday the 14th, they were distributed during the beginning-of-year meetings of the vice-principal tables of Infant and Primary Education Colleges and Secondary Institutes under the coordination of the Ministry of Education of the Cabildo de Lanzarote.
The work is born from the work and sensitivity of Raquel Niz Torres, a researcher deeply linked to the territory and its people, who dedicated her life to documenting a wisdom at risk of disappearing. Alongside her, Jaime Gil and Marta Peña have also compiled a significant portion of the traditional knowledge about plants and the plant culture of Lanzarote, understood as a collective heritage transmitted orally over generations.
The Biosphere Reserve counselor, Samuel Martín, has stated the importance of including these botanical knowledge about the use of the island's herbs in formal education "as a living and valuable biocultural heritage that must be preserved".
