Go-Go Goji: They're Berry Good For You
The next hot health item (no. 3271 and counting).
Credit: Rob Forbes
Ready for the next big health food cure-all? If you've been googling around for natural health remedies, chances are you've already come upon it: miraculous Tibetan goji berries. These little vitamin-filled wonders, native to the hills and valleys of Tibet and Inner Mongolia, have exploded into a health hysteria across the Western world (which repeatedly counts on the Eastern world to save it from its own bad habits).
Due in part to the publication Goji: The Himalayan Health Secret, by Earl Mindell (celebrated nutritionist of Vitamin Bible fame) and Rick Handel, goji berries are now extolled as not only one of the most nutritionally dense foods on the planet but also an effective antiaging agent. As gojis are heralded on such Web sites as BeYoungNow.com or FountainofYouth-Gojiseed.com, you may well wonder what this is all about.
The story goes that the berries and their juice (selling nowadays for up to $50 per liter) are indeed the "secret" to a longer, healthier life. Gojis (the term is allegedly a colloquial Chinese name for the Tibetan variant of the Chinese wolfberry, also known as Lycium barbarum) have primarily been studied in various universities in China and the Ukraine over the last fifteen years. Allegedly, inhabitants of the Himalayan regions where goji vines grow live to be much older on average than people throughout the rest of the world. (Or could it be that thin air and long, frigid winters just make life seem longer?)
Gojis also score well beyond the highest point on the ORAC (oxygen radical absorbance capacity) scale developed by U.S. Department of Agriculture researchers. This finding means that the antioxidants found in gojis can blunt the damage to cells due to free radicals produced over time. According to many goji-touting Web sites, the berries also contain at least eighteen amino acids, twenty-one trace minerals, scores of essential vitamins and fatty acids, more iron than spinach, more beta carotene and carotenoids than carrots, and more Vitamin C than oranges. In other words, this may be the most action-packed go-go berry since Chuck himself.
All this information may make gojis sound like the best thing since sliced tofu. Even a friendly skeptic who visits the Goji Health Stories Web site can't help but wonder where all these fervent testimonials are coming from. Surely a mere placebo effect couldn't cure everything from arthritis to acne?
"We don't think in those terms," says Bruno Schuitemaker, owner of Shen Nong Herbs, a Chinese herbal medicine pharmacy in Berkeley, California. Lycium barbarum, according to traditional Chinese medicine, is quite simply, he says, "good for the eyes, and as a tonic for the liver and kidney. It helps with blurry vision." Those benefits don't make gojis the be-all and end-all of berries, it seems, but whether that's because the Chinese-grown variety differs greatly from wild Tibetan gojis, as Gojiberry.com and other goji groupies declare, or because the front line in the war on free radicals has moved further into health food's terra incognita, is for you -- with that pricey jug of goji juice -- to decide.
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Class Action Lawsuit Against FreeLife International Inc.
Dear Goji Friends, We are pleased to announce that a “Class Action Lawsuit” has finally been brought against FreeLife International Inc. (creator of the “Tibetan Goji Hoax”), in THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT, District of Arizonia, for “misrepresentation and deception in the marketing and sale of certain products.” You may read the “Complaint” for yourself from this .pdf file on our website. Please help us expose this fraud.
http://www.gojitrees.com/FreeLifeClassActionLawsuit1.pdf
Yes, "Himalayan" and
Yes, "Himalayan" and Tibetan" are pretty much just marketing ploys. So the argument over whether Himalayan goji berries or Tibetan goji berries are better is rather amusing to me.
Say No to 'Tibetan goji'!!!
I know I have long way to go. It seems always easier to make up a story and spread a rumor than tell truth to stop a lie. I notice some web sites have started to tell the truth and serious investigators have disproved 'Tibetan goji' notion, but you will find majority of goji sellers would like to link their product to mysterious Tibet or Himalayas regions...I don't know why American goji customers are enchanted by 'Tibetan goji', is it because goji is "produced in unpolluted roof of the world" as claimed, or anything labeled with Tibet can arouse sympathy of the westerners who are motiviated to help the poor Tibetan 'goji farmers'? If I tell you goji is produced in a region where Muslim people takes 40% of the population, what do you think?
Goji or gou qi or Chinese wolfberry has been used in Chinese medicine over one thousand years it is proven effective in anti-aging, and immunization ehancement by numorous documents and practices. What I want to do is tell the truth of goji, what it is and where it is produced, and which brand is the regarded best in Chinese medicine. I can't help feeling amusing when I think Americans regard 'Authentic Tibetan goji' as the best while NOBODY knows 'Tibetan goji' in China, a nation that has been using this small red berry in their medicine and diet before Europeans immigrated into North America.
For more information, visit my website go-goji.com
Tibetan goji berries
I grew up in Zhongning, 'hometown of goji' in China, I've never heard of Tibet goji and or Himalayas goji. Ningxia is famous for growing goji in China and goji produced in Zhongning is the best in quality. I talked with my relatives and friends in Zhongning, some of them are goji expert, they all said Himalays goji is a hoax delibrately linking mysterious Tibet to goji to lure more buyers. Other places that grow goji in China include Inner Mongolia, Xingjiang, etc, but production and quality are all inferior to that produced in Ningxia. In China goji customers are encouraged to learn tricks to discriminate Ningxia goji from goji produced in other regions, such as Inner Mongolia, but NEVER Tibet...because there is no such ting!
One piece of information: the average elevation of Tibet is 15000 feet, the summer is extremely short, except barley almost nothing can grow there. Even goji survive the long and cold winter, does it really have time to yield? 'Tibetan goji' selled on the internet is amlost drowning me, if as claimed they are picked wild, how many people would be enough to pick the wild berries to suffice the huge American market?
Ningxia is the smallest province located in northwestern China, very few people immigrate to North American due to backward economy and semi-separation of the rest of the world. As a native of Ningxia, I feel I am obligated to speak out the truth, help with confusion on goji mystery.