The "Technical Specification for the Production Process of Plant Extracts" began to solicit comments

Reporter Yang Xiaojing

The "Technical Specification for the Production Process of Plant Extracts" (hereinafter referred to as the "Technical Specification"), which was established in 2017 and jointly drafted by the China Institute of Standardization and the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, has been studied for 5 years and has recently solicited opinions from the public, and the deadline for feedback is December 18
, 2022.
Industry experts believe that for a long time, China's plant extracts have no unified production specifications, simple water extraction or alcohol extraction will produce many different control processes and process parameters, so standardizing the extract production process, from resource utilization to enhance product market competitiveness, will have far-reaching significance
.

Promote the gradual standardization of the industry

Plant extracts are very complex and not only contain a variety of chemical components, but also have different components in different
parts.
Generally, plants contain a variety of chemical components: alkaloids, glycosides, organic acids, resins (including resin acids, resin alcohols and hydrocarbon resins), volatile oils, sugars (including starch, inulin, gum and mucus, etc.
), amino acids, proteins and enzymes, tannins, plant pigments (including chlorophyll, carotenoids, flavonoids, betaene, and quinones), oils and waxes, and inorganic components (trace elements).

Plant extract is a product formed by using plants as raw materials, according to the use needs of the extracted final product, through the process of physicochemical extraction and separation, and directionally obtaining and concentrating one or more active ingredients in plants, without changing the structure of its active ingredients
.

According to the different components of the extracted plants, glycosides, acids, polyphenols, polysaccharides, terpenes, flavonoids, alkaloids, etc.
are formed; According to different properties, it can be divided into vegetable oil, extract, powder, lens, etc
.
Plant extracts can be used in food, medicine, beauty and other industries
.
There are many kinds of plant extracts, and there are more than 2,000 kinds of plant extracts produced in China, and more than 5,000 production enterprises
.

The "Technical Specifications" pointed out that the plant extract industry is developing rapidly, there are many production and operation enterprises, the market competition is fierce, the product quality is uneven, natural extraction and artificial synthesis coexist, high-tech enterprises and small workshops coexist, and the homogeneity of products is serious
.
The quality of plant extracts is greatly affected by factors such as origin and process, among which the production process has the greatest
impact on its quality.
Extraction solvent, extraction temperature, extraction method, concentration method, drying method, etc.
will have a great impact on the quality of extract products, which is also the reason for
the uneven quality and unstable quality of plant extracts.

In order to promote the benign and healthy development of the plant extract industry, it is necessary to standardize the plant extract production process, make the quality of the corresponding products consistent and stable, and enhance China's international discourse power in the field of plant
extracts.
At the same time, because many plant extracts are directly used in health food, the evaluation is basically based on the standards of medicinal extracts in the process of health food application review, but the existing raw material materials and test results show that there are a variety of process sources
for such raw materials.
In addition, because its quality standards are also in accordance with pharmacopoeias, foreign standards and even custom standards, it has caused the inconsistency
of raw material specifications.

At present, there are no relevant standards
in the International Organization for Standardization that deal with the technical specifications of plant extracts production processes.
China also has no corresponding national or industry standards for plant extract production process, only some social organizations have formulated some corresponding plant extract quality standards, and some important technical steps lack a guiding description, which is not conducive to the corresponding standards to guide practice
.
Therefore, industry insiders said that the formulation of the standard plays an important role
in guiding the development of related industries.

Promote enterprises to improve quality

Chinese herbal medicines and food and medicine are often used in food, health care products, cosmetics, etc.
, in most cases, they need to be extracted and processed to obtain water-soluble, oil-soluble or alcohol-soluble effective substances, so as to facilitate the development and application
of later terminal products.
The issuance of the Technical Specification is directly related
to the standardized production and processing of medicinal and food homologous extracts and standardized quality control.

First of all, the extraction process is clearer
.
The extraction process is the most important process in plant extracts, but previously, the process and specific parameters were not described in an unfolded manner, so there was no substantial guiding role
.
The "Technical Specification" requires production enterprises to refine the extraction process, improve the technical parameters of each step, and truly have the role of practical guidance and standardization of
production.

Secondly, the agreed content of the extract standard is more perfect
.
The previous plant extract standards focused on the quality standards of products, and after the introduction of the Technical Specifications, relevant enterprises must take the extraction process as the key content for standard agreement
.

Since the current group standards and industry standards of plant extracts are based on the quality requirements of the product, the common extraction process description is relatively simple, such as raw materials through water extraction, concentration, extraction, spray drying, crushing, mixing, packaging, the formation of products, the production process of important technical steps have no guiding effect, is not conducive to standardized production, no traceability, and also causes great trouble
to daily supervision.

After the issuance of the Technical Specification, the quality standards of the extract will be more specific in terms of process description, and the content will be more binding and practical.

When necessary, the enterprise needs to provide the process flow chart, as well as the extraction and processing process description and other technical parameters
.

Third, the extraction and processing process is more standardized
.
According to the "Technical Specifications", the extraction process needs to have clear process flow, parameters and technical indicators of process key control points, more standardized management, and more traceability of the production process, which is conducive to the production management of the enterprise itself and convenient for the inspection of the market supervision and management department
.

Fourth, the same extract is easier to standardize
.
At present, most plant extracts are produced
with reference to enterprise standards, industry standards, or in accordance with the standards of medicinal extracts when declaring health foods.
The same raw material will have a variety of processes, production conditions are also different, product specifications cannot be unified
.
After the issuance of the "Technical Specifications", the process of the same extract will be transformed into a better extraction method, and finally form a unified
market and basically the same product specifications.

Fifth, low-end extraction technology will be eliminated
.
From the perspective of raw material extraction and utilization, only those enterprises that have long-term research on the extraction process and explore better experimental conditions will have better process control and obtain more stable and high-quality extracts, while low-end enterprises will eventually be eliminated
.

Industry insiders believe that the release of the "Technical Specifications" can promote the benign and healthy development of the plant extract industry, promote enterprises to explore and develop more new ingredients through process transformation and optimization, improve product quality standards, and improve market competitiveness
.

China Food News (November 14, 2022, version 06).

(Responsible editor: Yang Xiaojing)