Promotion of Herbal Medicine

Ministry of AYUSH has taken the steps to promote and publicize Herbal medicine among the people by the following ways:

1. Organizing of Arogya Fairs, Health Fairs/ Melas / Exhibitions both at the National and State Level and an Annual event namely, Ayush scheme
2. Celebration of important Days of AYUSH Systems, Ayurveda Parv and Yoga Fest/Utsav etc.
3. Participation in Health Fairs/ Melas / Exhibitions organized by Government Departments, State Governments and other reputed Organizations;
4. Preparation and distribution of authentic Publicity material on AYUSH Systems including Multi-media/print media campaigns, audio visual materials for popularization of AYUSH Systems;
5. Providing financial assistance to reputed organizations, NGOs, educational/ research institutes for organizing Seminars, Conferences, Symposiums, Workshop, meeting, etc. on AYUSH Systems.
6. Providing incentives to AYUSH Industry to participate in Arogya and other Fairs/ Melas/ Exhibitions/ Conferences/ Seminars etc. organized by Central/ State Governments/ Government organizations/ reputed organizations like Chemexil, Pharmexcil, CII, FICCI, ASSOCHAM, ITPO etc. at State/ National level.
7. Virtual Webinars / Exhibitions on Ayush related topics.
8. Media campaign through social media.
9. The Councils is providing treatment through General OPD, RCH OPD, Geriatric OPD, NCD Clinic etc. conducted by 18 Clinical Institutes / Units of the Council.
10. Programme on integration of Unani Medicine in National Programme for Prevention and Control of Cancer, Diabetes, Cardiovascular Diseases and Stroke (NPCDCS) has been initiated in collaboration with Directorate General of Health Services.
11. Similarly, another SCSP/TSP mobile health program is being carried out by the Council. Under this programme, villages having SC/ST population have been selected to create awareness for preventive aspects of different diseases and to provide treatment to the patients through different centres of the Council.

(c):       Ministry of AYUSH, Government of India is presently implementing Centrally Sponsored Scheme of National AYUSH Mission (NAM). Under ‘Medicinal Plants’ component of the NAM scheme supporting market driven cultivation of prioritized medicinal plants in identified cluster/zones with in selected districts of States and implemented in a mission mode.  As per the scheme guidelines, the support is provided for:

• Cultivation of prioritized medicinal plants on farmer’s land.
• Establishment of nurseries with backward linkages for raising and supply of quality planting material.
• Post-harvest management with forward linkages.
• Primary processing, marketing infrastructure etc.

Under this scheme, subsidy @30%, 50% and 75% of cost of its cultivation is provided for cultivation of medicinal plants throughout the country.

Ministry of AYUSH has allocated an amount of Rs. 13467.71 lakh and released an amount of Rs. 7572.40 lakh during the last two years under Medicinal Plants component of National AYUSH Mission (NAM) scheme throughout the country to cover an area of 16739.59 hectare under cultivation & promotion of medicinal plants and related activities.

National Medicinal Plants Board (NMPB), Ministry of AYUSH & Ministry of AYUSH have supported 2,27,009 hectares area for cultivation of medicinal plant from Financial Year 2008-09 to 2014-15 under National Mission on Medicinal Plants (NMMP) and from the Financial Year 2015-16 to 2019-20 under National AYUSH Mission (NAM) scheme throughout the country.

The National Medicinal Plants Board (NMPB), Ministry of AYUSH and Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (C-DAC) have jointly developed “e-CHARAK” mobile application as well as web portal for the promotion and marketing of medicinal plants/herbs. The “e-CHARAK” an e-channel for Herbs, Aromatic, Raw material and knowledge is a platform to enable information exchange between various stakeholders mainly farmers involved in the medicinal plants sector across the country. The “e-CHARAK” application supports different local languages and it also provides fortnightly market price of 100 Medicinal Plants from 25 herbal markets across India.

Ministry of AYUSH has also supported creation of 39 District Collection Centres, Rural Collection Centres, Retail Outlets for easy sale and purchase of medicinal plants under National AYUSH Mission scheme.

The Minister of State (The Ministry of Ayurveda, Yoga & Naturopathy, Unani, Siddha and Homeopathy), Sh. Kiren Rijiju (Additional Charge) stated this in a written reply in the Lok Sabha here today.