Anyone with an interest in herbal medicine knows about arnica. As well as being a homeopathic first-aid remedy, it is also used for physical and emotional shock, to promote healing, control bleeding and reduce swelling.

But few people who use it realise that it could soon become an endangered species. Its use has rocketed with the popularity of complementary remedies.

It is difficult to cultivate on a commercial scale, and collectors uproot an estimated 250,000-300,000kg of wild flowers each year in Europe.

In addition, hundreds of kilos of dried roots are consumed each year, according to conservation group WWF.

While collection is strictly monitored in France, Hungary and Germany, the trade price for arnica montana is so high that people in poorer countries are still ripping it up.

It was this less-than-soothing story that prompted Oxford MBA student Jessica Shortall to choose an arnica project for the social entrepreneurship' option of her course at the Said Business School.

She said: "We joined a project run by WWF in Romania, where arnica montana grows semi-wild.

"It is dwindling, partly because of loss of habitat, as well as over-harvesting. According to the WWF botanists, it requires nutrient-poor soil, special climate conditions and semi-cultivated land.

"In Romania there are acres where hay grows for part of the year and is then mowed, and that is when the arnica grows. If the land is fertilised in any way, the arnica goes."

The community in Ghetari is cash poor, and villagers live on whatever they can grow themselves. And somehow, local knowledge of herbs has been lost, and people did not know that arnica had healing properties.

Ms Shortall said: "If the people in this rural area start to get chemical fertiliser, they will use it - I would, too, if I was in their position, because they could grow a crop that would be more lucrative than hay or arnica.

"We looked at the financial side, as well as the social and environmental values. The botanists were wanting to preserve the plants.

"What we were saying was Well, of course they would want to increase their standard of living'.

"Could we come up with a scheme that would produce all these benefits - financial as well as environmental?"

The team discovered that a drying house to preserve the plants on site would increase the price at which the community could sell the product.

Ms Shortall contacted Architecture for Humanity, which built a drying house from local materials, using local labour.

However, the numbers still showed that arnica alone would not allow the enterprise to break even, since it was highly seasonal.

The team suggested that the drying house could also be used for local products like blueberries and mushrooms, which were gaining a higher profile with the rise in eco-tourism in the area.

There was also the problem that many Romanians tend to have a short-term perspective, because their economy has been so unstable.

"If we put in a project to add value to the arnica there needed to be checks to make sure that they didn't pick all the arnica that year.

"How could they be sure that the higher price would last until next year?

"They might put the money into something that would last, like an animal or farm equipment. It was possible to do more harm than good."

She added: "There are no easy answers and I don't know if they have adopted our recommendations. It was a huge learning experience. We came up against lots of problems."