Does the source of an ingredient really matter?

As you know, there are products on the shelves that vary quite significantly in price for what appears to be the same item. This is true whether it is a bottle of herbal supplements or an extract of healthy mushrooms. A decade ago, I would select what I was looking for by grabbing the "best value" off the shelf. If there was a $8.99 version and a $19.95 version, as there so often is, I would select the cheap one. Thinking about that buying philosophy years later, I now understand why so many of those products I bought proved ineffective.

With dietary supplements, the expression "you get what you pay for" is almost universally true. While there are certain products that are just chemical entities and priced as commodities, most products have significant differences between them based upon where in the world they come from. (As an example of a commodity, ascorbic acid is just plain ascorbic acid, no matter which way you look at it. Of course, brands and quality control will differ, but hey -- even Nobel Laureate Dr. Linus Pauling said you should buy Vitamin C as cheaply as possible.) Plants, on the other hand, can vary dramatically even in the same species, depending upon where they are grown. Rhodiola rosea would grow right in my backyard in Arizona if I wanted. But, in comparison to a plant from the Arctic circle, it would have almost none of the same impact on my system.

And yet, I could grow and market the plant as a supplement and have no problem with regulators, even though the product would give the consumer no boost in energy, mental clarity, or any of the other benefits of daily consumption of Rhodiola with a product like Arctic Root. In the case of Rhodiola, this is because the plant gets its power by fighting the odds, and developing its own immune system in the extreme conditions of the Arctic region.

Another wonderful product category are the immune boosting mushrooms that we are hearing so much about lately. One of those companies is located right here in Arizona (Desert Forest Nutritionals). And yet, their mushrooms come from Brazil. They specialize in a very unique and highly potent medicinal mushroom which we'll talk about more on this website in the near future, the Agaricus blazei Murrill mushroom.

Unfortunately, in the field of herbs, particularly mushrooms, the plant sucks up whatever is in the ground and whatever toxins are in the water supply. That's why the Japanese, huge consumers of Agaricus blazei Murrill mushrooms, buy 90% of the market for the Brazilian mushrooom. You'd think they'd buy it from Asian sources, right? Not so . . . the Japanese realize how dangerous certain plants and herbs can be that are grown in countries like China and South Asia, where unrestrained industrial growth has contaminated so many formerly pristine growing areas for botanical remedies.

The source of your herbs and supplements REALLY does matter, not only for the most effective use of the product, but also for safety from contamination by heavy metals and toxins. The excellent article linked to the headline of today's post describes this safety issue in more detail.

Next time you are considering a specialized supplement, consider its source, and how much difference this makes in the quality of the outcome. In a future post we'll discuss whether or not the herbal products industry is truly a long-term sustainable industry, or whether we are tapping all the earth's botanicals without consideration of the needs of future generations.

[PS added May 5: Just found a great article from Taipei, Taiwan. Even the Taiwanese people are concerned about the contamination of products coming from mainland China. See the comments section for link!]

Dave