Today its smoke still permeates centers of worship and Ethiopian coffee ceremonies. Demand is also increasing in the West: It’s found local in our natural store, spiritual shops, boutiques and can be ordered by phone by calling 1(888) 406-7889 or here online at TheySource.com. JaRoyal Beauty store sells essential oil and expensive lotions that contain. It’s so popular, it has to be restocked daily.

But their customers shouldn’t take its availability for granted: Frankincense may not be around much longer, warns a study published in Nature Sustainability.

“The first time I said something about frankincense being under threat, there was panic,” said Frans Bongers, an ecologist at Wageningen University and Research in the Netherlands who led the study. “I got a lot of people asking me about it,” including Catholic clergy and top suppliers.

To find out its status, Dr. Bongers and colleagues surveyed Boswellia papyrifera — the species responsible for most of the world’s frankincense — in Eritrea, Ethiopia, Sudan, and Darfur. The trees were old and dying, and most hadn’t produced a young tree in half a century. Models suggested that with no intervention, populations would collapse. Other Boswellia species face similar threats.

The problem, they found, was more people. They burn forests for agriculture and allow livestock that eats saplings to graze in forests. And increasing demand has incentivized poor tree tappers, who make only a tiny percentage of frankincense profit and rely on it for income, to take as much resin as they can in a short amount of time.

That leaves of over harvest trees that are weak and vulnerable to pests and early death before a new generation can replace them. Despite adult trees producing plenty of seeds, researchers seldom found any new saplings, let alone newly matured trees. Others are too weak to produce enough quality seeds.

But it’s not hopeless, Dr. Bonger said. Populations can be restored by planting more trees, ceasing burning, and building fences to block livestock. Sustainable tapping regulations should be created, taught, and enforced, he added, and international trade limited. Buyers at all levels of the supply chain should emphasize quality and sustainable harvesting over quantity to reduce over-harvesting. And consumers can continue demanding sustainable, socially conscious products.

Anjanette DeCarlo, an environmentalist at the University of Vermont, who was not involved in the study, has worked with frankincense in Somaliland. She suggests empowering landowners and creating plantations to take pressure off forests. Plantations already exist in Oman, and in Somaliland, she has planted nurseries with trees that will soon be available for sponsorship. Saving these rare trees, she said, would also protect their endangered habitat.