Abstrack:
The Turgo community in the slope of Merapi Mountain Yogyakarta has long been known to live very closely with the threats of volcano eruption of Merapi Mountain of Yogyakarta. With its unique situation, which lies perfectly in the southern slope of Merapi and in The Merapi National Park, this community develops varieties of local wisdom that helps them survive against the disaster, the increasing land-clearing due to tourism developments, and the challenge of climate change. This research was conducted to understand the traditional uses of plants that are important to Turgo community for their sustainability. In addition, this research aimed at identifying the rituals that have a possible link with conservation of plants of the Merapi National Park. Using several methods of data collections, such as surveys and open-ended interviews, we found that people of Turgo categorize the uses of plants into: medicinal plants, ornamental plants, aromatic plants, cattle-fodder plants, natural-pesticides plants, dye-source lants, building-material plants, edible plants, and plants required for rituals. the Turgo community has been practicing ancient rituals such as Memetri tuk, Ndamel Griyo, Ngunduh Mantu, and Wiwit. Memetri tuk is a ritual performed to save the water. Ndamel griyo is performed when people start developing their houses, and ngunduh mantu is one of a weddding rituals. Wiwit is the starting ritual before rice-harvesting. All of these rituals uses local plants as their main essence. These rituals, in turn, have been helping the conservation of plants in the Merapi National Park.
Full Text: