By Chinonso Alozie

The Imo state government and the Former Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, Professor Maurice Iwu, on Friday said they would  unveil some standards for medicinal plants in the state. 

This was disclosed to newsmen in Owerri, by Professor Iwu, while announcing this year’s 2023 herbs fest in the state.

He pointed out that natural medicinal plants remained a billion dollars untapped opportunity in the country. 

According to Iwu, “Herb fest is a festival of herbal of health. We do it yearly.  It is a collaborative efforts with the Imo state government through the ministry of health. It starts from 12th of this month. This herb fest has been since 1992. Medicinal plants is good we are talking of over 400 billion dollar opportunity. The problem we have is that we have not invested in this area.

“For medicine, all drugs have their sources from natural herbs.  During the covid 19, people think that africa will die off. But what survived us was the natural plants. At the herbfest, we will unveil some standards for the medicinal plants. 

“There will be a clinical dialogue session where we will discuss modern management of diabetes which is food based.  We will look at modern approach to health. we also want to look at the synergy with the medicinal plants. We will show our people how to plant, cultivate and how to protect medicinal plant so that they will not go into extinction. We want to make this sector a viable one. Is just that Nigeria is not investing so much in it. Other countries like American, india among others are doing it. 

Imo state Commissioner for Health,  Dr. Prosper Success Ohayagha, shortly said:  “We are loosing billions as a result of not investing in this sector.  On that day of the herb fest,  we will interrogate and cross fertilize ideas and see how to continue to develop these areas for the betterment of our people.”