Health Supplement Concerns

Since early 2019, Chinese health and market regulators have launched a nationwide crackdown on illegal practices in the health product industry, including false advertising, selling counterfeit and low-quality products, and violating the rights and interests of consumers. Statistics from the State Administration for Market Regulation showed that during the 100-day campaign, 2,534 cases of false advertising were investigated with a market worth 283 million yuan (US$41m). Under Chinese law, companies supplying health supplement products with an annual market size of hundreds of billions of yuan are operating in a gray zone as they are neither officially categorized as health products or food, meaning the market has seen explosive growth with no adequate supervision. From 2014 to 2018, Chinese health supplement enterprises merged and acquired a growing number of overseas enterprises with an investment of over 2.5 billion yuan (US$363m). It is high time for regulators to establish an effective and comprehensive regulatory mechanism targeting the chaotic market.