He’s an innovator because…he envisioned and created the American Herbal Pharmacopoeia, recognizing the need for an authoritative botanical monograph series.

Background:

Roy Upton began his work as an herbalist more than 20 years ago while living in a traditional Native American community in Nevada. After several years of studying ethnobotanical traditions of various Native Americans, Roy was engaged in four years of ethnobotanical studies of the medicinal plants of the U.S. Virgin Islands. Thereafter, he completed a formal three-year clinical training program in Traditional Chinese Medicine, which was augmented by pre-medical studies, training at the Shanghai University of Traditional Chinese Medicine and residency training at Longhua Hospital, Shanghai, China.

He was a co-founder and is vice-president of the American Herbalists Guild, the primary organization in the U.S. for the advancement of professional medical herbalism. More recently, he founded the American Herbal Pharmacopoeia, a non-profit research organization developing national quality control standards for the manufacture of botanical supplements and providing critical reviews of therapeutic information regarding botanicals.

In addition to his research, political and educational work, Roy has been an active member of the standards committee of the American Herbal Products Association for more than 10 years, is the general manager of the California-based herb company Planetary Formulas, is the author of several books, including the highly acclaimed Botanical Safety Handbook of the American Herbal Products Association (published by CRC Press) and serves on several industry advisory boards.

Words of Wisdom:

What has been the biggest challenge you’ve faced thus far?

“Convincing industry of the importance of developing a pharmacopoeia monograph system for botanicals. This is predominantly because there are many different organizations working on different solutions: certification programs such as the ‘whistleblower approach’ (taken by ConsumerLab.com) versus other industry initiatives such as NNFA’s GMP/Trulabel program and the certification programs of USP and NSF. But if you look internationally, virtually every other country has quality control standards based on a pharmacopoeia system. This way manufacturers know exactly how to assess the quality of the raw material. When you have a quality raw material to start with, you have to be a pretty bad processor to put out a bad product. In contrast, if you start with a poor quality raw material, you have to be an exceptional processor just to get a product that will be acceptable. Similarly, if you do not know what standards should be adhered to in the first place, it does not really matter if your product is certified—it may still be a poor quality product.”

What should be the measure of success in our industry?

“Success is not measured in numbers, but in product confidence, and we’re failing miserably. We are subject to at­tack in the media and our greatest failure is not getting across the message about the positive benefits of herbals. This industry started from an altruistic belief in the value of medicinal plants in human health. Our base customers are philosophically aligned with that belief and still have confidence in our products, but the growing mainstream population does not. Our success will lie in our ability to market the fact that these products are integrated into primary medicine in virtually every other country and that there is a lot of value to be gained from their use.”

Where would you like to see your company/your work/your industry in five years?

“I’d like to see 100-150 monographs fully developed or published and see the majority of industry adhering to specific quality standards. In five years this is a realistic projection if the industry were to get behind the initiative wholeheartedly.”

Are we making a difference?

“Tremendously. The industry has brought a number of health innovations to the American public—organics, low fat and low sodium diets, the importance of diet in overall health, antioxidants—but we’ve never strutted our stuff on the herbals. We need to teach about the international acceptance of our products.

“A great example is the use of natural products in immunodeficiency disease. The alternative AIDS community has changed the thinking of how medical academia approaches AIDS and HIV with the use of Chinese herbal tonics. These people are still living because they focused on preserving the health of the host rather than simply attacking the disease. This is one demonstrable way that herbal medicine changed the medical community.”

If you could change one thing, on an industry-wide scale, that would open up new opportunities for all industry, what would it be?

“Implement a strong marketing campaign to teach about the inherent value of herbal medicine. The quality control stuff will take time to implement throughout the entire industry but the process has begun. Now consumers need to be made aware of the tremendous value of botanical medicine before they go for the stronger, more expensive, more toxic options provided by conventional pharmaceuticals.”