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After that fateful day when hoodia gordonii was introduced to the whole country as the next weight loss wonder in the health world, a great demand for it rose. The facts that this wild succulent plant only grows in the South African desert and can only be harvested after 5 years, make the supply of this plant far lower than the demand for it. The tricks of the trade From this great scarcity of hoodia gordonii stems the counterfeit products in the market which claim to have the genuine plant. Being choosy is the least thing you can do as a consumer as about 80% of weight loss pills claiming to have this plant are actually fake. So how do you know then if a certain weight loss product you wish to buy contains that same hoodia gordonii cultivated in South Africa? How can you tell if a nutritional supplement does have authentic hoodia gordonii and not just some starch or sawdust? Separating an authentic hoodia gordonii product from an adulterated one is not just one whole simple procedure. This is for the reason that two labs heading the giving of authentication to various companies in the United States actually conduct different processes. Apart from this, they disagree on how these processes must be done and even on the very definition of what real hoodia gordonii is. Needless to say, some companies may get authentication from one lab and none from the other so this makes the whole testing for consumers more complicated. Penned on paper Now most websites, even those owned by health companies themselves, always advise that you look for a company's C.I.T.E.S. certificate. C.I.T.E.S. stands for Convention on International Trade of Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora, which is based in Cape Nature of South Africa. They issue this document to regulate the exportation of hoodia gordonii as this plant is a protected plant species. However, seeing that a company has a copy of the C.I.T.E.S. certificate does not guarantee authentication. This is because a lot of companies result to fraud by copying certificates uploaded by other companies and editing them in Photoshop to make them look real. Another way to know if a company is a legal hoodia importer is to look for their USDA Import License. All companies who import real hoodia gordonii are granted license by the USDA and are registered by them. The last method to determine if, indeed, a hoodia gordonii product is authentic is by passing it to Alkemists Pharmaceuticals for a series of lab tests. This lab's tests can detect if a sealed product contains real and pure hoodia gordonii. However, you must make sure that their lab report for a company's product is not more than 6 months ago. Filtering fact from fiction Despite the fact that the authentications mentioned can be adulterated by several companies, it's a good thing that there are still some ways to make sure that a hoodia gordonii product is genuine without spending too much. Pay attention to the price. Don't think that buying a $25 product is bang for your buck. Pure and genuine hoodia gordonii costs from $200 to $350 per kilo. This means that the food supplement must really be costly, especially considering its scarcity. It is best to trust those companies who sell their products for more than $40. However, some companies who put sawdust in their products even raise their prices as they know this fact. That is why you can turn to some independent writers out there who provide honest articles about the hoodia gordonii industry. Make sure that they have no affiliation with any health company. They are usually investigative journalists who recommend authentic hoodia gordonii products in the market without getting paid by any health company. Most of them have tried the products themselves and have encountered several fraudulent companies who fool the public by selling counterfeit hoodia gordonii. The best thing you can do as a consumer is to filter all testimonials and articles you see online and distinguish the true information from the fictitious ones. Even online forums could be contaminated by false testimonials, thus, it is best to take it from independent writers themselves.
Article Source: http://www.thehealthmanual.com
Read more about weight loss, creatine, hoodia, fish oil, and calcium.
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