Phytopharmaceutical industry in India: An insight towards its growth and sustenance

Advancements in technology coupled with versatility in healthcare approaches led to the rise of a section of herbal medicines called phytopharmaceuticals. The paper presents some factors that affect the scope for rise of phytopharmaceutical industry in India like industrial crops sector and trade, richness of Indian herbal resources, cultivation advantage and government schemes to support development of phytopharmaceuticals. Environmental hazards, loss of biodiversity, plant disease issues, and genetic erosion can occur during the collection and processing of herbs for phytopharmaceuticals. Thus the paper further lists some approaches that can be adopted to sustain the industry e.g. CRISPR technology, DNA barcoding, metabolic engineering, hydroponics, ultra sound assisted/ supercritical fluid based extraction.