The American Botanical Council announced that Euromed, a Spain-based botanicals company, has adopted fig through its adopt-an-herb program.
 
Euromed’s adoption will support ABC’s HerbMedPro database, ensuring that this unique research remains up to date for researchers, health professionals, industry members, students, consumers, and other members of the herbal and dietary supplement industries. HerbMedPro provides access to important scientific and clinial research data on the uses and health effects of more than 265 herbs, spices, medicinal plants, and fungi.
 
“Euromed is a longtime supporter of ABC initiatives,” Andrea Zangara, Euromed’s head of scientific communication and marketing, said. “Fig is our second adoption through the Adopt-an-Herb program, with milk thistle being the first. Euromed is committed to expanding the body of safety and efficacy studies on botanical products and relies on organizations like ABC to disseminate this information. The fig adoption fits perfectly with our mission to develop, innovate, and supply high-quality, traceable, sustainable, and evidence-based botanical ingredients for a healthier world.”
 
“ABC truly appreciates Euromed’s adoption of fig on ABC’s highly useful HerbMedPro database. Not only is fig a widely popular food in many parts of the world (it’s one of my favorites!), it also has health benefits,” Mark Blumenthal, ABC’s fonder and executive director, said. “Euromed’s fig adoption will allow ABC to stay current on the scientific and medical research on fig, confirming the proposition that food is medicine.”
 
Euromed was founded in 1971 as a pharmaceutical group originally named Madaus, and recently launched a line of fruit and vegetable extracts, including the fig extract ABAlife, which contains high concentrations of ABA through a water-only extraction technology.
 
Historically, it is believe that figs are the first domesticated fruit crop, with fig remains discovered from about 11,400 years ago at a village near Jericho in Israel. About 5,000 years ago, the Sumerian King Urukagina reportedly wrote about fig. An excavation of the Uluburun shipwreck, a late Bronze Age shipwreck discovered in 1982 off the Mediterranean coast of Turkey, contained fig remains among the cargo. Figs are dense in nutrients, including the phytochemical abscisic acid, which has an apparent ability to stimulate cellular uptake of blood sugar, and studies have shown that figs contain anti-inflammatory, antimicrobial, antioxidant, and antitumor properties.