Medicinal Plant Production in a World of Climate Change: Implications for Quality and Long-Term Trade Viability

Climate change, in combination with over-exploitation, habitat destruction and additional human intervention, impact the availability and quality of plants used for medicine across the globe. Possible consequences are changes in the chemical composition, supply shortages and price increases, which -in turn, can lead to the market appearance of low quality, highly diluted or adulterated botanical products. Some supply issues can be alleviated by cultivation, but not all medicinal species are easily cultivated, and in many areas of the world, wild-growing plants are the main source of herbal medicines. Besides efforts to combat the climate crisis, solutions include more sustainable cultivation and wild-harvesting practices, additional regulations that favour more feasible (or renewable) production of herbal medicines and botanical food supplements, better enforcement of current regulations on feasible production of medicinal plants, industry-wide initiatives to source, formulate, and manufacture products following more environmentallyfriendly ("green") practices, and changing consumers' purchasing behaviour to put more emphasis on products that follow certain sustainability standards. In addition, education of regulators, farmers, collectors of wild plant materials, industry members, researchers and the public about the impact of climate change on medicinal plant species and the need for implementation of sustainable practices is necessary to ensure future access to herbal medicinal products and botanical dietary/food supplements and the long-term viability of the trade.