Novel method for dynamic monitoring and early-warning on wild resources of traditional Chinese medicines based on price ratio between drug and foodstuff

Abstract

To probe into the new idea along with establishment of a novel method for dynamic monitoring and early-warning on the wild resources of traditional Chinese medicines (TCMs). The alterations of wild traditional Chinese medicinal resources were assessed through the price ratio between drug and foodstuff (PRDF) indicating the balance between supply and demand of the specific TCMs, referred to the price ration between pork to foodstuff which is used in national monitoring to the balance between pork supply and demand. Since the price of rice was tightly controlled by government, it was selected as a relatively stable reference to build the PRDF in order to take away the non-marketing influence to TCMs price such as CPI and inflation rate. The modified relative alteration trend of TCMs price had been researched through comparing different formulae to build PRDF, including absolute average month price of TCMs, month average price ratio of TCMs to foodstuff (rice) , month-on-month change of TCMs to rice, year-on-year change of TCMs to rice, and difference in value of period-on-period change (DVPPC). In the research, Cordyceps, Glycyrrhiza and totally five herbs were selected as model drugs and the price data were collected from 2002 to 2008. The results showed that DVPPC calculated of relative long time window was more sensitive and stable to reflect the relative alteration trend of TCMs price. For instance, the DVPPC of Ligustici showed continuously increase trend in recent years. This suggested appearance of unbalance between supply and demand of Ligustici, and forced policy intervention to maintain reasonable and continuable utilization of Ligustici resource. The proposed method and the formula of DVPPC revealed some useful guidance for dynamic monitoring the wild resources of TCMs.