Innovation

Since 1956, the German drug manufacturer Hevert-Arzneimittel (former name: Hesopharm Pharmaceutical Products) has dedicated itself to the development of natural medicines. The company, headquartered in Nussbaum, Rhineland-Palatinate, is one of the leading German manufacturers for homeopathic and herbal medicines as well as high-dose micronutrient preparations.

The global pharmaceutical industry is very profitable. With a worldwide revenue of about 971 billion euros per year (2017), the pharmaceutical industry has a notable sales volume in the world market. In Germany alone, around 53% of the population regularly takes medication. Is this really about human health? Is it really the right way to make people "healthy" with synthetically produced medicines, or should we rather address the root cause of these problems?

The corporate philosophy of Hevert GmbH, in comparison to synthetic pharmaceutical manufacturers, is not only to combat the complaints about diseases; instead, Hevert-Arzneimittel goes much further and wants to tackle the problem at its roots. "Hevert-Arzneimittel stands for health. We do not want to offer only ready-made medications, which help humans to become healthy again. We want to make people healthy by providing an intact environment and society.“ explains Mathias Hevert, CEO of Hevert GmbH.

With its many years of experience in naturopathy, Hevert GmbH combines traditional medicine with modern production technologies and tries not only to cure the symptoms but also to combat the causes of diseases with sustainable natural substances—all with substances that cause as little harm as possible to the people and the environment. Health, humanity's highest good, should be in harmony with nature.

Inspiration

The company was founded in 1956 by Emil and Dorothea Hevert with the aim of achieving economic independence and investing their many years of experience in the manufacturing of their own preparations. Even the choice of the headquarters did not come by chance and should illustrate the closeness to nature. "Hevert-Arzneimittel is a family business, and our grandmother and grandfather as well as our father were always aware that an intact environment is necessary so that humans can live a healthy life. As a company, we therefore have the responsibility not only not to harm nature, but in the best case also to positively influence it," said Mathias Hevert.

The initial sustainability ideology of the company's founders is still being driven forward and expanded today by Mathias Hevert and his brother Marcus Hevert in the new generation. "For me as a Managing Director, sustainability means behaving in such a way that the side effects for the environment and for people are as low as possible and that the company orients its business activities in such a way that it creates added value, not only for the owners of the company, not only for the employees, not only for the directly affected stakeholders, but for the society as a whole. And that's for the long term and not just temporarily.“

Overall impact

Medicines are serious environmental pollutants that end up in bodies of water and water supply systems during production. As the current situation in India shows, the pharmaceutical stronghold produces low-cost antibiotics and other medicines for the world as well as for the European market, through which toxic chemicals and active substances enter the waters and the earth through untreated waste water, from which both animals and humans suffer health damage.

With the processed homeopathic mother tinctures as well as the herbal medicines of Hevert, a high degree of purity and active ingredient content is guaranteed by targeted drug purchase and contract cultivation of medicinal plants in connection with the strictest quality control. In 2014, Hevert-Arzneimittel started its own cultivation of medicinal plants at its headquarters. In the future, fresh plants for the production of pharmaceuticals will increasingly come from the company's own cultivation. In addition to acquiring expertise in the growth, cultivation, and harvesting of medicinal plants, quality assurance will be a key priority.

“A healthy, intact environment and an intact society are essential for human health. For example, where the environment is polluted by pollutants, insects die, plants can no longer pollinate, and the society has problems and causes problems for the people who live in it. In all these cases, we see a place where health cannot be created. So we, as a company, are not only trying to cure people from their diseases. Furthermore, we also try to behave in a way that does not harm the environment. The goal for the future is to combine the long tradition of homeopathic and herbal medicinal products with the high quality standards of modern pharmaceutical production,” mentioned Mathias Hevert.

Business benefit

Under the leadership of the second generation, Dr. Wolfgang Hevert, the company was able to expand its repertoire with numerous newly developed products and holistic therapy concepts, which brought the company visible national success.

Today, in the third generation under Mathias Hevert and Marcus Hevert, the company not only meets the modern pharmaceutical requirements but also relies on its tradition and traditional experience. A broad product portfolio with 100 medicines, which covers almost all naturopathic therapies, should serve as a basis for this. For several years, Hevert has been working more closely on opening up foreign markets. The Hevert products have already been successfully established in the market in Chile, China, India, Colombia, Luxembourg, Austria, Russia, Mongolia, and Ukraine, as well as in the United States and United Arab Emirates. Hevert also sells its products internationally under the umbrella brand Hevert-Arzneimittel with the promise of quality "Made in Germany" and homeopathy from Samuel Hahnemann, the founder of homeopathy. True to the "Hevert means health" mission, the goal is to make the natural low-impact medicines available to therapists, pharmacies, and patients worldwide. "We try to make naturopathy attractive. Naturopathy must also have a radiance, so the human being going to the pharmacy or the therapist, if they have various medicines to choose from, prefers a modern preparation with naturopathic tradition over a conventional preparation. At the same time, we are also trying to protect our naturopathic medicines scientifically, because the demands on modern medicine are increasingly linked to the subject of scientific evidence. So, we are not only focusing on tradition and to support traditional experience, but also want to create scientific facts through our own clinical research, for example, which then help us again to bring naturopathy closer to even more conventional medicine oriented people,“ emphasized Mathias Hevert.

Social and environmental benefit

For years, Hevert-Arzneimittel has been actively committed to environmental protection and environmentally sound management. At the heart of Hevert's corporate philosophy stands a cooperative and gentle approach to nature, to which the company owes the majority of the active ingredients used in Hevert products. More and more emphasis is being placed on the company's own cultivation of medicinal plants, which not only saves many transport costs, but also allows cultivation according to the strictest requirements without any chemical additives. Further attempts are being made to dispense potential chemical active substances for medicines by focusing on the company's use of these active substances, such as the use of ethanol, which is extracted from special wheat cultures without any chemical fertilizers.

As a family business in close touch with nature, Hevert is actively committed to naturopathy, environmental protection, and sustainable business practices: "We have already installed a photovoltaic system here on the roof many years ago, which will significantly be expanded in 2019/2020, and a photovoltaic system is being installed on our childcare facility. We have completely switched to an electricity provider that offers only sustainable electricity, and in this way the entire company is supplied with sustainable electricity. A few years ago, we completely rebuilt our server landscape so that we could reduce the power requirement of this technology by 80%. We modernized our ventilation systems and now only use ecological coolants.“ In addition, great importance is attached to biodiversity at the company location. "We have established bees here at the site, we have built a hotel for wild bees."

The company management is always aware that sustainability consists of not only taking internal measures but also raising awareness of the outside world as a holistic unit. "We want to promote awareness to all employees, visitors, and customers, and thus create sensitivity here in the company and convey this to the society. We have company clothing made of organic cotton, which also raises awareness - 'we love nature,' one of our claims. We want to tell everyone that we not only love natural medicines, but also nature as such and that we are committed to sustainability. By that, we want to encourage other companies to do the same and, in their efforts to be economically successful, also take more care of environmental aspects.“ In doing so, the company is increasingly focusing on establishing direct connections with society, such as the organic Christmas market initiated by the company. "Exhibitors are hand-selected. They may offer only organic food here; the tinkered and sold articles must satisfy strict requirements and originate from lasting production. The message is clear: Hand in hand for an intact society, hand in hand for health!”

Interview

Mathias Hevert, Managing Director