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American Journal of Ethnomedicine
ISSN: 2348-9502
April 16-17, 2018
Amsterdam, Netherlands
Pharmacognosy 2018
Page 20
6th Edition of International Conference on
Pharmacognosy and
Medicinal Plants
Statement of the Problem: In 1999 Colombia, the world´s most
biodiverse country per square meter and home of 2,400 plants
with medical properties, woke up with a picture in the front
page of all newspapers. This picture shattered the dream of all
Colombians that we were going to finish the year, the century, the
millennium in peace. The picture was f the empty seat – when
the headof the FARC, the oldest guerrilla group in the world,
stood up President Pastrana in the middle of the peace talks.
Two weeks later, the picture in the papers was of the earthquake
in the coffee zone. The rest of that year was shattered dreams
and earthquakes for Colombia. That year we had 80% of the
kidnappings in the world. 55% of the terrorist acts in the world
happened in Colombia that year. 400,000 Colombians, 1% of the
population, left the country. There was a graffiti on the way to
the airport which read - “will the last one to leave, please turn off
the lights”. That year, our economy plummeted. For the first time
in written economic history, our GNP decreased - 4.3%. 1,200
companies went bust and Colombia´s best humorist, Jaime
Garzón, was shot to death. While all this was happening, I was
running McDonald´s and teaching a business strategy class.
I askedmy 39 students - “which of you sees yourself in Colombia
in 5 years?” Only 12 raised their hands. Unable to sell Colombia to
my students, I was perplexed.I then understood that the stories
of success which we were told were almost always, foreign. And
the local stories were incredibly vivid and terrifying. I realized we
lacked local positive models, reasons to be proud, examples,
sources of inspiration. One of them is pharmacopsy and how we
leverage our biodiversity.
Biography
Pedro Medina is a pioneer in Colombia and Latin America in Asset Based
Development, specializing in how to leverage the biodiversity in a sustain-
able way transforming the huge botanical treasure in medicine, the sys-
tems, insights, best practices of nature into solutions for mankind – bio-
mimicry, and the fauna into engaged tourism – bird watching. He leads
an NGO called Yo Creo en Colombia and for the past 18 years has created
contents which lead to a new discourse in his country. He is part of the
board of advisors of Colciencias, the Colombian National Science Institu-
tion.
Pharmacognosy and the Peace Process in
Colombia
Pedro Medina
Yo creo en Colombia, Colombia
Pedro Medina, Am J Ethnomed 2018, Volume 5
DOI: 10.21767/2348-9502-C1-005