If you benefit from functional mushrooms, here's a story that'll boil your blood. Bristol Fungarium (a small UK mushroom company doing genuinely good work) just got slapped with a "Novel Food" classification by the Food Standards Agency for Turkey Tail and Cordyceps militaris.
You read that right. Novel. Food.
These are mushrooms have been used medicinally for literally thousands of years. But apparently, because they weren't officially consumed "to a significant degree" in the EU before May 15, 1997 (yes, that's the arbitrary cutoff date), they're now treated like some potentially harmful lab creation.
The Absurdity of It All
Turkey Tail is one of the UK's most abundant mushrooms. You've probably walked past hundreds of them without realising. It's been cherished in Traditional Chinese Medicine for over 2,000 years, used by Indigenous North Americans as a healing tea, and is one of the most extensively researched functional mushrooms in modern science.
In Japan, extracts of Turkey Tail have been used alongside clinical cancer treatments for decades. The science on its beta-glucans and polysaccharide compounds (PSK and PSP) is robust and peer-reviewed.
Cordyceps militaris is also native to the UK (those bright orange fruiting bodies foragers know well). Valued for centuries in TCM as an adaptogen for energy, vitality, and resilience. Again, mountains of traditional use and modern research backing it up.
Cordyceps militaris is caught in regulatory limbo because the specific strain commonly cultivated was isolated in the mid-90s. Despite being one of the most extensively studied mushrooms in the last decade, that timing means it falls afoul of the 1997 cutoff date.
This Isn't Just About Mushrooms
Bristol Fungarium aren't alone in this nightmare. Back in 2022, food marketing specialist Richard Horwell (a guy with 30 years of FMCG experience and over 100 brand launches under his belt) wrote a scathing piece for FoodNavigator absolutely eviscerating the FSA's Novel Foods process.
His take is it's "not fit for purpose" and is actively crushing innovation in the UK food and beverage industry.
Horwell pointed out that while British entrepreneurs are being "ripped off to the tune of hundreds of thousands of pounds" to get products approved, the US and Canada have raced ahead. They're at the vanguard of a health food revolution – CBD oil, hemp, monk fruit, and yes, mushrooms like Cordyceps and Turkey Tail – while the UK ties itself in regulatory knots.
The numbers are damning. In March 2021, out of several thousand Novel Foods applications, only 210 were considered viable for further consideration. And this was right as COVID sparked a massive surge in demand for healthy, plant-based products.
As Horwell put it: "So many people are coming through my door wanting to use natural health foods in their products, but I have to tell them it can't be done. It's not allowed until they have gathered and submitted extensive evidence to the FSA."
Sound familiar? That's exactly what's happening to Bristol Fungarium and the UK's mushroom supplement industry right now.
Why This Hasn't Been Challenged Before
No one has seriously challenged these classifications before. Not because the classifications make sense, but because the process is financially crushing and incredibly time-consuming.
Most small businesses simply can't afford to fight. They either quietly comply, shut down, or pivot away from these ingredients entirely.
But Bristol Fungarium is taking a different approach. Their goal is to prove to regulators that there's no fundamental reason for these mushrooms to be categorised as novel foods in the first place. This benefits everyone. Foragers, growers, other small businesses (like us!), and consumers who want access to these traditional medicines.
They're moving forward with the backing of a supportive community of scientists who understand how disconnected this classification is from reality.
Why This Matters
Look, I'm all for food safety regulations. The industry should be held to high standards. But this decision is divorced from actual science, ecology, or centuries of medicinal knowledge. It's bureaucracy eating itself.
Once something gets the "novel food" stamp, it triggers an expensive, time-consuming approval process requiring extensive safety assessments and documentation. For a small company like Bristol Fungarium (who've safely served thousands of customers over six years), they simply don't have the resources to fight this alone.
They need around £50,000 to gather evidence, conduct testing, navigate the regulatory maze, and engage legal specialists. They've already put in £10,000 of their own money to kick things off.
My Take
This is one of those moments where well-meaning regulation becomes actively harmful. We're not talking about some sketchy supplement with unknown compounds. We're talking about mushrooms that grow in British forests, that have been safely consumed across cultures for millennia, and that have solid scientific backing.
The message this sends is troubling. That traditional knowledge doesn't count. Centuries of safe use doesn't count. Even being native to the UK doesn't count. Only arbitrary EU bureaucratic cutoff dates matter.
And while the UK strangles its own innovation with red tape, other countries are building booming industries around these exact same products. It's more than frustrating. It's nonsensical and economically self-defeating.
Bristol Fungarium is asking for community support. Financially if possible, but also by just spreading awareness.
If you care about access to traditional medicines, about small businesses doing things properly, or just about common sense prevailing over bureaucratic box-ticking, this one's worth paying attention to.
You can learn more and support their campaign here. Even if you can't contribute financially, sharing this story helps build the pressure needed to fix genuinely broken policy.
6 comments
I’m flabbergasted about this decision,so very sad…..