Economic evaluation of some plant resources from Neelum valley Azad Jammu & Kashmir (AJ&K)

Neelum valley (nv),azad jammu & kashmir (aj & k) was surveyed for the study and documentation of economic plants. the study employed common ethnobotanical methods including field observations,informant consensus factor (icf),fidelity level (fl),data matrix ranking (dmr) and preference ranking (pr). information collected from 100 informants was documented using rapid rural appraisal (rra) method and visual appraisal approach (vaa). in this study,58 economic plants of 52 genera and 38 families were documented,collected and identified to support the data. the leading family was asteraceae (6 spp.),followed by fabaceae,fagaceae,lamiaceae and pinaceae (3 spp. each). the most common used parts were leaves (25.81%) followed by whole plant (16.13%),root and bark (12.90% each),fruit (10.75%),seed (6.45%),wood and flower (5.38% each),aerial parts (3.23%) and stem (1.08%). the economic use categories with relatively higher icf values were medicinal and fuel (0.67% each),followed by construction (0.58%),fodder (0.37%),furniture (0.25%),vegetable (0.4%),veterinary (0.2%),ornamental (0.1%),and roof thatching (0.03%). the economically important plants with higher fl value were saussurea lappa,aconitum chasmanthum,ajuga bracteosa,bistorta amplexicaulis,geranium wallichianum,jurinea dolomiaea,cedrus deodara (fl 100%). dmr results showed that c. deodara stood first being the most multipurpose medicinal plant,followed by quercus incana. c. deodara. q. incana,s. lappa,a. bracteosa,and g. wallichianum are under considerable biotic pressure due to extensive use in different life sustaining processes. in pr,informants ranked fuel (20.39%) as the leading threat to the floral diversity that results in biotic disturbances and deforestation. it was followed by construction (19.74%),timber (18.42%),grazing (17.76%),urbanization (12.50%) and fire (10.53%). the ranking of threatened economic plants indicated that s. lappa is the most threatened followed by a. chasmanthum and abies pindrow.