Hoodia has been shown to be a very potent appetite suppressant in human trials to date. It tricks the part of your brain that controls your hunger to feeling full, ensuring you can go on through out the day without requiring as much food.

There are many websites and information sources that all talk about how effective real Hoodia is and the great job it does in controlling what goes through your mouth. What is rarely talked about is the impact that it has on your metabolism.

If you study how we humans react to a sudden shortage of calories, you'll realize that using Hoodia by itself can actually be counter-productive in the medium and long terms.

The reason is because when your body experiences a sudden decrease in your caloric intake (because hoodia is so effective), it goes into 'starvation mode'. What that means is that it slows down how quickly it burns calories throughout the day, because it believes you are literally starving to death. Your body doesn't realize that food is so abundant these days, that you choose when and when not to eat. It still believes that you are a hunter/gatherer, who may have to wait days until the next big meal. So, when it finds that your calories per day has decreased tremendously, it will conserve as much energy as possible.

That means your metabolism slows down. That means you burn fat at a slower rate. On top of this, if you are not providing the nutrients your body needs (because you're eating far less than you should because of the hoodia), you will not be able to maintain the muscle tissue you have. This is a massive disadvantage if you want to lose weight since muscle tissue burns fat, faster than fat tissue.

So how can you reverse this trend, and still enjoy the benefits of Hoodia?

There are two main ways. The first way has to do with your diet, and how you eat, and how you use Hoodia. Although Hoodia is very effective at controlling your appetite, you want to ensure that you don't become dependant on it. So use it with the intention of weaning off it in the short to medium term as you form better lifestyle habits to keep the weight off for good.

So we recommend you use Hoodia if you like comfortable eating for instance, to feel full so you don't eat unnecessarily. We do recommend you eat a balanced nutritious meal. In summary, you want to make sure you are eating to ensure your body gets all the great nutrients, vitamins, minerals and other essentials it needs, and not being tempted to eat what's not going to help your weight loss. So use Hoodia to focus on eating great wholemeal foods, and get into good habits. That way you're getting into the habit of eating to live, rather than living to eat (as the old saying goes).

Using Hoodia in this way will ensure you don't suffer the declining metabolism rate as quickly.

The second way to reverse the effect of the declining metabolism rate. There is only one way to do this. That is to exercise. The key to a higher metabolism rate is to have more muscle tissue. As we've mentioned above, muscle tissue burns fat a lot quicker than fat tissue. So how do you maintain your muscle tissue, so that you give yourself the best chance to take the extra weight off and keep it off?

You want to ensure that your exercise program incorporates both aerobic fitness (cardio) and anaerobic fitness (weights.

So now you know what to do, what about the Hoodia itself?

To follow the instructions set here, we suggest you really check and track your Hoodia suppliers. Hoodia is an over the counter supplement at the moment. That means it is not as heavily regulated as prescribed drugs are. So you need to be able to trust your source.

How do you do that?

Having searched all over the internet, we've found a site that passes exactly the criteria we would use for selecting Hoodia (and then some) so that it is absolutely pure. Here is why we would recommend it:

• Its products have 100% Pure P57 Hoodia Gordonii from South Africa and nothing else on the ingredients label. There are no other ingredients, additives or fillers in the capsule, tablet, pill or in its liquid form - just look at the label. If they aren't showing you the label on the website, you may have to be a little suspicious. Again, don't fall for companies just selling 'Hoodia' - remember there are many versions of the Hoodia plant;
• Their Hoodia is organically grown, and not a synthetic compound. Real hoodia Gordonii takes 4 years to mature and 6-7 years to be at its peak. As you know, it's not widely available.
• A certificate of authenticity from a respected Testing company (Alkemists Pharmaceuticals) that conducts random anonymous trials to ensure that what is claimed on the ingredients label is actually what is delivered. You can even look at the certificates and the number of random tests that have been done. They are one of a handful of companies that are willing to put their product on the line for continued testing so you can continue to trust them.
• Endorsements from respected independent third parties such as Doctors or journalists that put forward their name in their endorsement, about the actual product label.
• They've had one of their successful clients featured on CNN and CBS news reports (you can watch the video on their website.)
• They've invested in farms in South Africa to ensure that will continue to have access to the highest quality form of Hoodia Gordonii in the long run. No other company we could find have made such an investment and is a sign of their commitment to delivering quality.
• They continue to provide royalties to the traditional Bushmen of South Africa who have used Hoodia for centuries. How many other companies would continue to make this payment to sell their hoodia?
• They are C.I.T.E.S certified, which means they have permission to export the Hoodia out of South Africa legally under international law. Many companies on the internet don't have this.

To visit this company's website so that you can see what else they do to ensure that you get the best quality Hoodia, click here.