The dietary supplementation business has never been bigger. Consumers are looking for specialized supplements hoping for their active role in preventing disease.
As consumers we understand that one of the most important decisions we can make for long term health is our choice of proper vitamins and minerals. The word "supplements" can be interpreted in multiple ways and therein lays the first problem. In this boom mentality, in this maze of products, one needs to be extremely knowledgeable about the total picture of diet and supplementation, the main players, and the best value of vitamins for our human biology, not just our pocketbooks.

Let's set up a little debate with the top three players in this business presenting their different points of view. One of the players is an imaginary figure and therein lies the second problem. Her voice is not heard on media commercials, splashed in ads or read on the side of bottles or boxes. But she originated vitamins and with imagination let's give her a speaking platform. For now, let's keep her name unknown and see if you can guess who she is.
First, there is Mr. Pops...he is a successful owner of a vitamin manufacturing company and produces colorfully labeled Optimum MultiVitamin Pills. He advertises copiously online and offline and people buy what sounds familiar and doesn't cost too much per item.
Second, is Dr. Smith who is a bioscientist in the newly emerging field of nutritional science only a few seconds old on a 24 hour medical timeline.
Third is our mystery guest, old, grand and venerable.

Mr. Pops gives us a quick overview of the vitamin industry.
"The word vitamin was first coined in the early 1900's by a scientist recognizing this "vital amine" as important to proper cell functions. To make our pills, we first bulk order 20 kinds of vitamin and mineral raw ingredients from a GMP registered facility. The mass production is automated on conveyor belts and starts with high speed tableting machines on paddles or ribbon blenders to allow for separation of particles based on density.
The carefully measured ingredients (as per label) are combined with other fillers, flavors, and colorants. The tablets are pressed and spray coated to help withstand the packaging and shipping process. We're pleased to say we use hydrolyzed vegetable protein which we believe allows for better absorption by the intestines than the cheaper mineral salts used by the majority of brands. We bottle the pills, label with a full disclosure of ingredients, stamp expiry date and ship.

We spend a lot of money on branding and advertising market recognition. It was a coup for us to get a multimillion dollar endorsement from a great sports star with a great likeable personality...young people want to be just like him and based on that, I'm sure, will buy the pills."

The mystery guest only smiles acknowledging silently that there are thousands of competitive companies like Mr. Pops, but most get their supplies from only 12 main manufacturers with the laboratory ability to extract raw ingredients.

Second is Dr. Smith, a nutritional bioscientist.

"I'll begin by first saying some exciting news that relates to grandma...
Remember when grandma first use to tell you to eat all your vegetables...she may have been right after all. She may not have told you that when you eat just one serving of vegetables you're ingesting at least 100 different phytochemicals or phytonutrients. But science is now validating this health connection to a whole base of ethno- botanical knowledge and plant pharmacology!
Plant constituents are variously called phytonutrients, bioflavanoids or polyphenols and are found in seeds, bark, flowers, and fruit skin. In fact, nutritional sciences have advanced in the same way as pharmaceutical science through molecular cell cultures and long term reviews to show a multitude of benefits in our plant food. Who would have imagined? Real food compounds have been proven to reduce allergic responses, prevent formation of carcinogens, control inflammatory conditions, lessen coronary heart conditions, reduce liver disease, protect against cataracts and macular degeneration, and inhibit bacteria and yeast. These bioflavanoids also scavenge free radicals that cause oxidative damage in the cells that is implicated in long term inflammatory and degenerative diseases. For example...blueberries by virtue of plant pigments (the known 40 anthocyanins and 300 other compounds) have 2400 times the antioxidant power of Vitamin E by itself.
No wonder the USDA (US Department of Agriculture) has pointed out that "it appears that an effective strategy of supporting health is to increase consumption of phytonutrient rich food." It is with just cause that the Cancer Institute and the Heart Institute recommend eating a variety of vegetables and fruit 5 to 7 times daily or more if possible. Statistics show that most people do not, but even for those who do, there is the overriding question of how nutrient-dense supermarket vegetables are because of factory farming, mineral depleted soil, green harvesting and storage. So many consumers subscribe to supplementing their diets as we've heard. Lately, the market trend is towards whole food extracts, super food formulas as liquid nutrition to provide the holistic synergy of total vitamins, minerals, and other essential nutrients rather than an array of pills. The question consumers need to answer in their own minds...do we trust what comes out laboratories more than what is already provided naturally?"
Both look towards the mystery guest...it is her turn to speak. Her voice is low and liquid like waves "shooshing" against a sandy beach.

"Thank you for your comments and I appreciate your efforts in helping people's quests for health. Your hearts are in the right place and I am particularly delighted to see how scientific studies are now validating our ancient wisdom.
Science is now corroborating what people have known that food from plants is our best source of natural biochemicals that support levels of biochemicals found in human metabolism. Health and disease begin in the single cell and each cell needs one hundred plus nutrients on a daily basis. Depriving even a few proper nutrients will cause cellular degeneration over many years which evolve into a disease.

You see I am known as Mother Nature and my provisions are the foundation of human biology from time immemorial. My language is the physical world and my physical elements became part of your physical structure...no formulas, no programs, no theories. My plant micronutrients become your cellular micronutrients and they are programmed to be part of your inborn potential for growth, repair and protection from disease.

In trying to understand the breadth and volume of my world, scientists have managed to delineate and classify me into "specialists" sections many with names that only linguists can pronounce. Currently scientists are struggling to classify at least 20,000 phytonutrients, of which only 4000 have been analyzed or tested. To appreciate my complexity, there are about 500,000 plant species in existence. Only a mere 10% have been investigated from a phytochemical and pharmacological point of view.

More sadly, food manufacturers have over processed, preserved
and de-nutriented my natural foods with thousands of artificial man-made chemicals. People can be compared to being "hunters" in supermarkets... loading their buggies with bottles, boxes and cans full of refined, reconstituted and fortified unnatural food stuffs. Yet our genetic biology has not changed that much from the earliest times when our diets were based on gathering foods, such as whole grains, seeds, fruits and vegetables.
Unfortunately, my lack of formal language has placed me in the back of the room, drowned out by louder more persistent voices carrying the debate, often based on profit margins. However, it is no longer reasonable to assume that a single substance whether nutrient, pill or drug, can aid or fix all of the body's interdependent systems. In my world, vitamins, antioxidants, phytonutrients, amino acids, essential fatty acids, enzymes and minerals work together.

In fact, I find myself in a strange place of having my natural plants, herbs and spices tested for their nutritional value and questioned in terms of "preventing, curing, mitigating or treating diseases." Drug companies especially cannot patent a natural plant and make no profits unless they can sell an exclusive "discovery" or a new and improved facsimile.

My hope for you is to begin to use the word phytonutrition in every day language...I am absolutely amazed that this word isn't even found in the dictionary but it should be heralded as the word of the century. Phytonutrition is all about using whole plant foods and supplementation to provide the essential micronutrients for metabolic energy, body building and protection against cellular diseases.

My last warning is if you're confused or lack knowledge about the studies drawn from scientific laboratories and manufacturing claims, then draw your nutritional and supplementation needs from the natural world. In my world, my foods are not designed as 'optimal daily recommended intakes' or parts of double-blind studies or bioengineering or some co-factor activity combination. Trust the Divine Mastery of Nature. Be awe inspired that you can trace the course of nutrients through the ocean, the air, the soil, your plants, your body and back to the ocean again. You are of the earth. Protect and embrace it as you protect and embrace yourself."