section_path: Resources
section_name: Resources
paragraph_text: Resources
  
  The Himalayas are home to a diversity of medicinal resources. Plants from the forests have been used for millennia to treat conditions ranging from simple coughs to snake bites. Different parts of the plants – root, flower, stem, leaves, and bark – are used as remedies for different ailments. For example, a bark extract from an Abies pindrow tree is used to treat coughs and bronchitis. Leaf and stem paste from an Andrachne cordifolia is used for wounds and as an antidote for snake bites. The bark of a Callicarpa arborea is used for skin ailments. Nearly a fifth of the gymnosperms, angiosperms, and pteridophytes in the Himalayas are found to have medicinal properties, and more are likely to be discovered.
  
  Most of the population in some Asian and African countries depends on medicinal plants rather than prescriptions and such. Since so many people use medicinal plants as their only source of healing in the Himalayas, the plants are an important source of income. This contributes to economic and modern industrial development both inside and outside the region. The only problem is that locals are rapidly clearing the forests on the Himalayas for wood, often illegally.