China Expresses Willingness to Develop Nigeria’s Herbal Medicine

By Abraham Olatokunbo

China has expressed willingness to collaborate with Nigeria to develop her herbal medicine.

China is perhaps the world’s largest producer of herbal medicine, with her Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) having evolved over thousands of years, recognized world over and currently earns the Asian country several foreign exchange.

Speaking at the Nigeria-Chinese Traditional Medicine Seminar organized by the Nigerian Youth Congress (NYC) in Abuja on Thursday, the Ambassador of China to Nigeria, Mr. Cui Jianchun said both Nigeria and China have already built a solid foundation in herbal products research and application.

He noted that: “We (China and Nigeria) are big countries with vast and fertile land and suitable climate for planting herbs. We have every reason and full conditions for win-win cooperation in the planting of herbal products and the development of traditional medicines.”

He said: “In my eyes, today’s event is a very good start, as long as we work together and go ahead hand in hand, the huge potential for cooperation in the field of traditional medicine will surely be released.”

He added that: “I have full confidence that in this field, both China and Nigeria will make tremendous achievements and reap fruitful results which will greatly benefit our two peoples.”

The Chinese envoy said: “Now we are going through great changes unseen in a century. For us, opportunities and challenges coexist. I do hope we can stand shoulder to shoulder, meet the challenges and seize the opportunities, go all out to make more contributions to the building of a community of common health for mankind amid the mounting global public health crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. I firmly believe that victory must belong to us and success will come straight to us.”

Also speaking, the President of Nigerian Youth Congress, Mr. Blessing Akinlosotu called on Nigerian government to explore the great potentials in the nation’s herbal and alternative medicine.

He said as the nation continues to search for way of increasing her foreign earnings, research and development of herbal medicine should be taken seriously as an area which can add to our foreign earning.