Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) has emerged as a focal point of China-Africa cooperation during the ongoing third China-Africa Economic and Trade Expo in Changsha, capital of central China's Hunan Province.

TCM cooperation forum held during the expo

For the first time in the expo's history, a forum on cooperation in the field of TCM was held. 

First launched in 2019, the expo has become a major platform for strengthening economic and trade cooperation between China and African countries.

Speaking at the forum, Huang Luqi, deputy director of the National Administration of Traditional Chinese Medicine, said that through cooperation with relevant African institutions, China has established overseas TCM centers in African countries such as Morocco, Zimbabwe and Mauritius.

During the expo, representatives from Nigeria signed a TCM service project with Shijiazhuang Yiling Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd., a prominent company specializing in TCM. The company is renowned for producing the widely recognized Lianhua Qingwen capsule, which gained recognition as an important Chinese medicine in the fight against COVID-19.

Explaining the significance of the deal, Sun Xuefei, general manager of the company's international trade center, said that four of the company's TCM products, including Lianhua Qingwen, which have been officially registered in Africa, will not only be available for sale through pharmacies in Nigeria but will also be used in Nigerian hospitals.

The company has registered its TCM products in eight African countries, including Zimbabwe and Kenya.

History of TCM cooperation between China and Africa

Since the first Chinese medical team arrived in Algeria in 1963, China has dispatched around 30,000 medical personnel to 76 countries and regions across five continents, with a primary focus on Africa, providing 290 million diagnoses and treatments for local people, according to the National Health Commission of China.

Many African scholars were attracted to China to acquire a better knowledge of TCM theory and practices. 

Diarra Boubacar, vice president of the Federation of China-Africa Friendship Association, has been promoting exchanges between TCM and African traditional medicine for nearly four decades.

Boubacar, who hails from the Republic of Mali in West Africa, came to China to study TCM in 1984. He obtained a doctorate in Chinese medicine from the Chengdu University of TCM in 1997.

He told Xinhua News Agency that he is working on a book with the theme of mutual learning between Chinese and African herbal medicines. He tries to collect and analyze information on the similarities and differences in the use and efficacy of herbal medicines, such as Albizzia julibrissin, which are used in both Chinese traditional medicine and African traditional medicine.

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Plant Chinese herbs in Africa

During an interview with Xinhua, Martin Chedondo, the ambassador of Zimbabwe to China, said that Zimbabwe's trade delegation to the expo hopes to explore opportunities to bring home herbal planting, processing, and laboratory testing technologies in order to establish a whole TCM industry chain and attract local companies into the industry.

"In China, I've seen huge fields of herbal plants. We really want something like that in Zimbabwe," the ambassador said.

Planting Chinese herbs in African countries has great potential.

Poria cocos is an edible fungus known as "Fuling" in Chinese that has been used as a Chinese traditional medicine for over 2000 years. In 2015, one variety of the fungus was introduced to Madagascar and achieved great success.

With the better conditions of the high local temperature, the one-year growth period of the Poria in China's Hunan Province can be harvested in Madagascar in only nine months.

The herb was promoted in South Africa the following year.

According to a report published on the website of the China-Africa Friendly Economic and Trade Development Foundation in 2022, only a few countries, such as Madagascar, Morocco and South Africa, have adopted commercial medicinal plant cultivation, and most African countries' medicinal plants are derived from natural harvests, for example, primary forests and national parks.

Scientific and reasonable harvest is the premise of sustainable development of medicinal material planting, the report says.

(Cover image via CFP, with input from Xinhua)

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