Daily: China's Restricted Exports Lead to Soaring Price of TCM Raw Materials

According to a survey conducted by the Japanese Herbal Medicine Preparation Association, the import prices of Chinese-made Chinese medicine raw materials soared during the four years from 2006 to 2010. As the living standards of the Chinese people continue to increase, the amount of Chinese medicine taken domestically surges. The Chinese government has supervised the export of Chinese medicines on the ground of preventing the indiscriminate use of herbs.

Japan is a major consumer of traditional Chinese medicine. Traditional Chinese medicine is widely used for colds, allergies and other diseases. More than 80% of raw medicines are imported from China.

The Hanbok Pharmaceutical Preparations Association, which targets 74 franchise companies, mainly investigated 30 kinds of crude drugs that were used in large amounts. The survey results showed that all crude drug varieties had risen in price, of which 70% of the licorice required for traditional Chinese medicine formulas had a price increase of about 22% in four years, while the prices of peony and cinnamon rose by 47% and 29% respectively.

Since 2000, the Chinese government has continuously strengthened the supervision of traditional Chinese medicines and introduced measures such as the lowest prices for raw medicine exports in order to prevent the indiscriminate harvesting of herbs and desertification in the producing areas.

The Nomura Research Institute believes that with the continuous improvement of people’s health awareness, the Japanese medicine market is expected to expand to 200 billion yen by 2015. At present, Japanese pharmaceutical companies have avoided the rise in Chinese herbal medicine prices by cutting production costs and increasing the cost of raw material prices, but they can worry about when they will be supported.