“The theft nobody talks about—Modern science uses Indian medical knowledge systems without credit”, The Print, January 12, 2024:

“With climate change knocking on our doors, it is sobering to note that a great many of these herbs are on the endangered lists of several international conservation agencies. The irony is that they became endangered precisely when they were converted into mass- produced cosmetic and health products, which increased their popularity.

And there lies the rub. For the modern market system to make a product that is optimal in quantity and viable to produce, sell and profit from, it needs to be produced in large quantities. And if producers increase, then there are larger number of buyers of the herbs, with only two possible outcomes – greater quantities are widely collected from the wild so that the prices of the products remain low, or small amounts are collected, which makes the product expensive and exclusive.

Either way, it does not consider the regenerative cycle of the plant because that does not match the production cycle of manufacture. Inevitably then, the more cosmetic products or medicines made from these plants become available, the more endangered the plants are likely to be……”

Read the full article at Theprint.com