Trend Analysis of Medicinal Plants in Kinnaur District, Himachal Pradesh, India

Trend analysis helps predict future events based on past time-series behaviour. Therefore, trend analysis of five medicinal plants having high economic value (chilgoza, kala jeera, dhoop, karro and kuth) was done during the period 2011–12 to 2020–21. According to the study, growth rate in real terms was seen only in Dhoop species, while the other species were dribbling due to overexploitation as these were easily accessible to the local population. Growth rate was recorded highest for dhoop (18.37%/annum) and lowest for kala jeera (4.75%/annum). Nominal price elasticity for chilgoza, karro and kuth was greater than one, indicating that their quantity is changing faster than price, whereas nominal price elasticity for kala jeera and dhoop was less than one, demonstrating that these species possess inelastic properties, with their quantity changing slower than prices. In the case of real price elasticity, only kala jeera was elastic in nature in real value terms, while the remaining species were inelastic. Scarcity ratio was found to be positive only for kuth, which indicates that the availability of this species is dwindling in the forests daily. Therefore, it is necessary to educate the local population on how to grow key medicinal plants, and every household that depends on the forests for these plants should be provided with in-depth guidelines on how to continue using them.