S.quinqueloba tree.

Sterculia quinqueloba is a tree species (Malvaceae) native to some of the eastern and southern African countries including Tanzania. Apart of its ecological importance around western Tanzania, it is also used as medicinal plant to treat various bacterial infections by the local people around Kigoma region without it being evaluated on its efficacy both on antimicrobial and cytotoxicity activities. This tree is also used by the Chimpanzee at Gombe National Park for food supplement in such manner that it might have more value along with nutritional one. This interaction of the use of S. quinqueloba by the human being and Chimpanzee around Greater Gombe Ecosystem is a basis for the setup of this project. S. quinqueloba plays an important role in ecological health of Greater Gombe Ecosystem, but majority of this tree is only found inside the Gombe National Park. Now since Gombe National Park (32 Km2 land area) is increasingly become as an island due to environmental degradation outside the national park, and since demand for natural resources, particularly S. quinqueloba is increasing in this area, then scientific researching for medicinal value of this tree together with the use of such information for promoting conservation practices like tree planting and sustainable utilization is of much paramount.

This project is therefore intended to address the twofold issues; to evaluate the antimicrobial, cytotoxicity and acute toxicity of extracts from leaves, stem bark and root bark of S. quinqueloba and use the information obtained to stimulate and gaining public support on tree planting activities through conservation education by describing the importance of this tree to both wildlife and human being. It is a project of its kind in the sense that, it seeks to use the information obtained as a benefit and incentive to community and hence promoting public support to plant this tree and others in the community land. Best conservation practices have shown that, under the right circumstances, the scientific evaluated medicinal values from plants can be translated into incentives for conservation and subsequently its sustainable utilization.

Communities around Kigoma Region will have privilege to use information obtained from this project through jointly implementation of conservation education around Gombe National Park between the project team and the park. Likewise this project will promote trust on the use of indigenous knowledge for community development and conservation and also stimulate further studies on the status and distribution of this tree around Greater Gombe Ecosystem.