ABSTRACT
The beginning of the Yamato era in the third century marked the unification of ancient Japan. Chinese medicine in Japan became the flourishing medical practice after the ninth century, and lasted for about 1,000 years until the Meiji restoration in 1868. In the beginning, the annual production of ginseng in Japan was about 70,000–200,000 kg. Scientific establishments and individual ginseng growers in the Caucasus, and the Ukraine, in the Baltic republic, and in Siberia have also amassed a vast experience in growing ginseng. Siberian ginseng is not known in Oriental medicine, although it is abundant in eastern Siberia, in Korea, and even in the provinces of Shan-si and Ho-pei of northern China. Panax ginseng contains the active ingredient ginsenosides, while Siberian ginseng does not contain ginsenosides. Panax notoginseng is a species of the genus Panax, and it is most commonly referred to in English as notoginseng.
