Ethnobotanical knowledge associated with use, management and conservation of feijoa (Acca sellowiana (Berg) Burret) in Southern Brazil

Farmers have domesticated and preserved biodiversity elements for millennia in a co-evolutionary process. However, with the agricultural revolution the intense environmental transformation has caused crop’s genetic erosion resulting also in ethnobotanical knowledge loss. This study aimed to access and systematize the local farmer’s ethnobotanical knowledge related to the use, management and conservation of feijoa (Acca sellowiana (Berg) Burret) in the Serra Gaúcha, Southern Brazil. We identified 10 distinct types of use, especially food, medicine and commercial, and 11 distinct management practices. Accordingly to the intensity of usage given to the species, local farmers were classified in different categories as growers, managers and maintainers, from which the Informant Diversity Value was obtained.  We showed that farmers have a significant diverse ethnobotanical knowledge related with use, management, and conservation of feijoa, that it is well distributed among them and it depends on the access of expertise technical assistance provided in the region.