Li Xueying

The Straits Times

Publication Date : 05-05-2014

Bank manager Xie Qing, 49, is a great believer in the cures of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM), be it wolfberries to strengthen her vision or lingzhi mushrooms to fight against viral infections.

But the Shenzhen resident is wary of the quality of the herbs sold in stores and prescribed by clinics. Expensive herbs like cordyceps should be quite rare but you can buy them everywhere now, she says. I do not know which to choose given the scandals about low-quality TCM.

It is such headaches that an upcoming TCM park in Hengqin, Guangdong province, hopes to treat, by setting higher standards for Chinese herbs and minerals.

A collaboration between the Macau and Guangdong governments, the 500,000 sq m park is envisaged to establish stricter quality controls and an incubation centre for research and development into new products. Building according to a 10 billion yuan (US$1.6 billion) masterplan by Singapores Ascendas is under way and it aims to open in 2020 with 300 firms.

Says Albert Chui, its business development manager: The problem with TCM products from China is the trust issue. We hope to help address that.

TCM, which claims a lineage of 5,000 years, remains popular in China including special administrative regions Hong Kong and Macau, and other Chinese-majority societies like Singapore and Taiwan, even as it gains a following in other parts of the world.

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New traditional medicine 'park" in China to raise standards