How Plants Heal: Medicines, Muthi and Mystery
Teacher: Jean-Francois Sobiecki
Cost: 2 days accommodation
Dates: Tuesday 09 September 2025 - Thursday 11 September 2025
Re-discover the healing and curative power of medicinal plants with herbalist and medicinal plant researcher, Jean-Francois Sobiecki, as he takes us on a journey investigating South Africa's wealth of traditional healing plants. His book African Psychoactive Plants: Journeys in Phytoalchemy is the first comprehensive inventory of psychoactive plants and their uses in Africa. Learn how to identify, use, and prepare indigenous healing plants on guided walks around the BRC and explore the fascinating and intersecting world of ethnobotany, neuroscience, and anthropology around healing plants and medicine. Jean will also introduce you the roots of holistic medicine, key principles of food as medicine, and how plant-based medicine works to help create a healthy body and mind.
View teacher details
Hide teacher details
Jean-Francois Sobiecki is a pioneering South African medicinal plant researcher, a qualified nutritionist, herbalist and research associate with the University of Johannesburg. He has conducted over 20 years of ethnobotanical research on South African medicinal plant use. With a B.Sc.Hons. EthnoBot. (UJ), Dipl Clin Nutr. (Aus) in qualifications, a book and a number of academic publications under his belt, he has been invited to present at international conferences. He is trained and qualified in medical anthropology, permaculture, clinical nutrition, and massage therapy and runs a private herbal and holistic medicine practice in Johannesburg and conducts regular workshops, trainings and tours on medicinal plant use for the public.
