Global perspective of health related edible plants from the agricultural point of view.

In knowledge-based economies, nutrition concepts evolve with advances in agriculture. As people around the world become more health conscious, national health becomes one of the main directives for agricultural policies, including that of functional foods and their global markets. This article evaluates the development of the functional food industry in Taiwan and other countries through analysis of R&D capacity and bibliometrics. It attempts to identify future trends in nutrition with technology foresight research. Taiwan has a wide variety of indigenous herbal plants, although its functional food related literature is not large compared with some other Asian countries. However, there are quality papers on the immunologic functions of edible plants Globally there is much interest in edible plants with antioxidant activity and those phyto-nutrients which might help reduce the burden of chronic illness as well as in the nutrigenomics that will lead to the design of foods with these properties. To make the most of available agricultural resources, countries like Taiwan should relate agricultural development to the nutritional status of their populations. This strategy will add significant value to global agriculture.