by Julia Pierrepont III

LAS VEGAS, the United States, Oct. 17 (Xinhua) -- Business was brisk as professionals specializing in pharmaceutical ingredients strolled the labyrinth of exhibits in the Mandalay Bay Convention Center in the U.S. city of Las Vegas.

The SupplySide West 2019 trade show opened on Thursday to a crowd of roughly 17,000 ingredient suppliers and buyers and 1,300 exhibitors from around the world.

They came to browse the 10,000 or so natural and man-made ingredients and solutions from global suppliers for food, supplements, vitamins, skin care lotions and more.

At the annual fairground, there was a welcome mat waiting for Chinese companies looking to do business in the United States.

"Chinese suppliers represent the largest number of exhibitors at the show outside of the U.S. group," said Danica Cullins, brand director and vice president of sales for events company Informa's SupplySide portfolio. "They bring a great deal of business and value to the show."

"This is the third year in a row that we've coordinated with China's Trade Development Bureau (TDB)," she added. "TDB really helped showcase the 79 Chinese suppliers here at the show under the China brand pavilion. They had a big, prominent display -- giant red stickers on participating member booths -- and helped in many other ways."

TDB, an arm of China's Ministry of Commerce, built the China Pharmaceutical Ingredients Brand Pavilion, a business promotion and exchange platform in conjunction with the China Chamber of Commerce for Imports & Export of Medicines & Health Products (CCCMHPIE).

CCCMHPIE's deputy secretary general, Chris Cai, was quick to point out, "Chinese medicine invented herbal remedies, so now our companies can share what we have learned with our global customers around the world."

Cai emphasized that after the Chinese companies invested more in research and development, "high quality" has become a new label of China's producers in the industry, in addition to strong manufacturing capability.

It is one of the reasons why exports of China's health and nutraceutical industry grew by 21.8 percent last year from 2017, reaching 1.67 billion U.S. dollars.

These top-tier companies showed in the pavilion have all passed the rigorous scientific testing and quality control procedures required by the United States, the European Union, Japan, Australia and others, Cai added.

Nancy Si of Shandong Yuwang Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd discussed with Xinhua the onerous process it takes to qualify for the approval of the U.S. Good Distribution Practices and the Food and Drug Administration for the company's 95-percent-pure pharmaceutical grade fish oil -- which might take as long as two years.

"Safety is the priority, so we do lots of testing of our products. We must ensure there is zero risk from our exported goods," she said.

U.S. functional ingredients companies like the City of Industry's AIDP in Southern California also rely heavily on China's safety standards in the food supplement arena.

AIDP supplies more than 200 commodity ingredients for diverse health and anti-aging formulations, many sourced from China.

"We source from many countries, but mostly from China, " said Xiao Wong, a product scientist at AIDP.

He added that it would be bad for business if they move raw material sourcing to some other countries that do not have rigorous testing capabilities and the quality control documentation they get from the Chinese sources.

"Our Chinese suppliers have value. Our customers trust them," Wong said. Enditem

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