With RBetno’s ethnobotanical collection now entering a digitized phase, companies working with Brazilian botanicals are gaining access to a much richer evidence base on traditional use, cultural significance and ecological context.
This transforms how we can think about product narratives: instead of generic “Amazonian superfood” tropes, we can anchor stories in documented community practices, historical timelines and plant-people relationships that have been curated by ethnobotanists and local institutions.
➡️ It also raises the bar for ethical sourcing.
❌ When digitised collections make clear which species are culturally keystone, under pressure or tied to specific territories, ignorance is no longer an excuse for extractive business models.
I’d like to see more brands treating digitised ethnobotanical collections as core due‑diligence infrastructure…not just as a nice academic reference.
Also, digitizing ethnobotanical collections is a milestone for biodiversity conservation, but it also surfaces hard questions about data sovereignty and governance.
Fonseca‑Kruel, V.S., Dalcin, E.C., Silva, L.A.E., and colleagues. 2026. The digitization of the ethnobotanical collection at the Rio de Janeiro Botanical Garden. Plants, People, Planet. Early View. DOI: 10.1002/ppp3.70105.