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KBioCorp invested RM15mil in 14 state-of-the-art equipment for biotechnology |
Friday, May 04, 2007 |
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Kedah firm buys equipment for RM15mil
By TUNKU SHAHARIAH,
KULIM: Kedah BioResources Corp Sdn Bhd (KBioCorp), a subsidiary of Kulim Technology Park Corp, has invested RM15mil in 14 state-of-the-art equipment to conduct tests and studies on herbal product remedies.
KBioCorp managing director Norsabrina Mohd Noor said that among the equipment purchased was the GC-TOFMS (gas chromatography-time of flight mass spectrometer) worth more than RM1mil.
TGC-TOFMS was one of the two such machines available in Malaysia, which was utilised to identify the chemical components and conduct purity tests, she told StarBiz.
Another equipment is the Fourier Transform Infra Red, also worth RM1mil, which is used to conduct profiling on trees, plants and identify prohibited components in the products.
Norsabrina said the machines were imported from the US, Germany and Switzerland.
She also said there were eight experts, including a chemist, a microbiologist and a botanist, backed by researchers from Universiti Sains Malaysia in Penang and Universiti Putra Malaysia in Serdang, working at KBioCorp’s laboratory.
The company was set up three years ago to provide research and development in the herbal industry.
“Studies showed that the local herbal industry has fallen short in many aspects, especially in terms of labelling their herbal products and getting approval from the Health Ministry. The labelling, with scientific breakdown of the product’s ingredients, is important to facilitate its entry into the global market and to convince the consumers,” she said.
“Herbal products produced by extracting the components from plants are safer, of better quality and more efficacious compared with those processed into powder.”
She said KBioCorp accepted whatever herbs or products from companies or individuals to conduct studies and had received products for research from Japan, Taiwan and the US so far.
“We don’t study the efficacy of the herbal products, except analyse them in detail for the active and non-active components and the presence of dangerous ones like heavy metal,” she said.
She added that entrepreneurs produced many herbal remedies based on their experience or on formulas handed down from generation to generation without clearly documenting the contents and methodology.
She also said a study conducted by the Malaysian Herbal Corp in 1999 stated that sales of herb-based products in Malaysia amounted to a staggering RM4.55bil annually.
Source: The Star |
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