국내 한약재의 유통상 품질 문제점과 포장표준화를 통한 대응방안 고찰

A Review on Quality Control of Korean Medicinal Herbs Through Packaging Standardization

The production, distribution, and consumption of Korean medicinal herbs have increased every year because of an increase of health considerations. But there are no sufficient standardization procedures in packaging and distribution systems related to these herb products. The standardization of packaging material and dimension could be a good addition for establishing proper quality control methods for Korean medicinal herbs. Medicinal herbs deteriorate under physical, chemical and biological hazards such as oxidation, textural change under high moisture content, color change by light, sanitation problems by insect invasion and contamination. Packaging standardization with proper functional packaging materials is critical to ensure the qualities of medicinal herbs. Also, storage and distribution efficiencies can be improved by achieving packaging dimension standardization. This review summarizes recent research trends related to quality evaluation methods and major quality deterioration factors of Korean medicinal herbs. This paper also offers reviews on some of problems and challenges in current packaging and distribution systems of medicinal herb industries and briefly suggests advanced quality control methods through packaging standardization.