The organization was founded in 1992 to help shape the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act of 1994 (DSHEA), the regulatory, quality, and public policy framework that enabled dietary supplements to evolve from a niche market into a global industry serving hundreds of millions of consumers worldwide.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve accomplished everything that we set out to do,\u201d Israelsen told NutraIngredients. \u201cWhen we began, we had one goal, and we were formed in a very different way than most associations. It was one mission. We were in a unique spot at that time that I\u2019d worked for Senator Hatch. He was in a very powerful position in the Senate, chair of the HELP committee, very large industry in Utah. FDA was literally battering and bashing the industry to a point where we really felt [that without] federal legislation or something dramatic, we as an industry had nowhere to go.\u201d<\/p>\n
UNPA \u2013 at that time known as the Utah Natural Products Alliance \u2013 was founded with eight companies, many of whom were intense competitors. <\/p>\n
\u201cI was proud that the founding members recognized, setting aside personal differences, we have a far bigger problem,\u201d he said. \u201cWe drafted a one-page outline of what it is we would need, flew to Washington, sat with Senator Hatch. He had always said to us, if you need help, let me know. And we didn\u2019t want to ask lightly, but I came in and said, \u2018Senator, we really need your help now\u2019. And he said, \u2018What can I do?\u2019 So, I hand him this one pager. He looked at it for maybe five or eight seconds, and he said, \u2018I\u2019m in\u2019.\u201d <\/p>\n
UNPA changed its name to the United Natural Products Alliance in 2005 to reflect the growing diversity and geographic reach of its membership, which expanded across North America, Europe, and Asia to include dietary supplement manufacturers, ingredient suppliers, contract manufacturers, analytical laboratories, scientific organizations, and service providers.<\/p>\n
The intention, said Israelsen, was to always be an alliance and not an association. \u201cWe agreed on ground rules,\u201d he said, \u201cwhich is one for all, all for one. Everything we would do would be by some level of consensus. Nobody had senior voting rights of any kind. That remained our approach from that date to this moment. And that has made us something of a different organization.\u201d<\/p>\n
UNPA still has six months of work ahead, during which time Israelsen said he\u2019d like to see FDA act on some of the key initiatives like the exclusionary rule, which he described as a \u201cbig problem that I believe is going to get worse before it gets better\u201d. Also on the list is a cleanup on the NDI issues, and he said he would dearly love to see a relook at GMPs, although that is unlikely in the next six months. <\/p>\n
Why now and what\u2019s next? <\/p>\n
Israelsen\u2019s contributions have been recognized with numerous lifetime achievement and leadership awards, including being named the NutraIngredients USA NutraChampion in 2021. Earlier this month, Sonoran University of Health Sciences awarded Israelsen an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree in recognition of his extraordinary contributions to the dietary supplement industry and public health.<\/p>\n
So why now? \u201cThe industry has evolved,\u201d said Israelsen. \u201cWe have a number of very capable organizations, trade associations. We now have a range of category associations that are looking after the affairs of now billion dollar-plus categories. That did not exist previously. My sense is the industry is well managed. It\u2019s in good hands, people who know what they\u2019re doing. <\/p>\n
\u201cAnd if I\u2019m ever going to take a look at the other side of the mountain, I think now\u2019s a good time. And it doesn\u2019t mean I disappear. It means that next year I will have a new freedom to think about and act on projects and ideas that I\u2019ve been interested in for a very long time, but honestly have not had the time to work on those as I would like to.\u201d <\/p>\n
Watch the video for the full interview, which also includes Israelsen\u2019s take on AI, whether the industry needs champions in Congress, the people who had the biggest influence on his career, and what to expect during its final UNPA member retreat in September. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The organization was founded in 1992 to help shape the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act of 1994…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":735195,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[61],"tags":[97,269],"class_list":["post-735194","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nutrition","tag-health","tag-nutrition"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/735194","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=735194"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/735194\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/735195"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=735194"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=735194"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=735194"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}