Production of traditional Chinese medicinal materials grows steadily

BEIJING -- China's production of traditional Chinese medicinal materials has maintained stable growth in recent years, an agricultural official said Friday.

The supply capacity of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) materials has continued to climb, with planting areas for such materials having reached around 50 million mu (3.33 million hectares) across China, doubling over the past decade, Liu Lihua with the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs told a press conference.

Notably, production layout has been optimized and seven major regions that specialize in authentic medicinal materials have formed across the country, Liu said.

China will work to build a number of high-level authentic medicinal material production bases, bolster the growth of advantageous TCM industrial clusters and specialized towns, and build distinctive herbal medicine brands to promote the high-quality development of the TCM industry, the official added.

He Yaqiong, an official with the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, said at the same press conference that China is accelerating the establishment of a traceability system for the entire TCM industrial chain.

This initiative includes developing a data platform to track quality across all stages of the TCM industrial chain. Standardized data protocols are also being implemented to enable full-process quality monitoring, He explained.

Equipped with real-time monitoring and data collection capabilities, the platform currently serves over 100 key TCM enterprises in the country, tracking 113 commonly used medicinal herbs, He said.