Chennai: With nearly Rs 4,000 crore worth pharma products being exported from Tamil Nadu alone, the state is fast emerging as a pharmaceutical export hub with a growth rate of 10 per cent a year, said Union pharmaceuticals department secretary V.K. Subburaj.
The country’s pharma manufacturing capability had increased tremendously in the past few years and reached around Rs 2 lakh crore in market value. “Its export business is more than domestic business. We are exporting more than Rs 1 lakh crore worth pharmaceutical products to over 220 countries,” he said after inaugurating a two-day trade expo ‘Pharmac South-2015’ being held under the aegis of the Indian Drug Manufacturers’ Association (IDMA) here on Sunday.
However, India’s contribution to the global market was only up to 2.5 per cent. This has to be increased to 25 per cent by maintaining quality. The Union department of pharmaceuticals will soon launch a Pharmaceutical Technology Upgradation Assistance Scheme (PTUAS) to help small and medium pharmaceutical companies to technologically upgrade their units and make them WHO-GMP compliant.
The scheme would provide aid to companies through financial institutions and an initial corpus of '500 crore had been allocated for this scheme. IDMA has urged the government to look into its demand on the need for separate Nutraceutical regulations from FSSAI, push for the API Industry to counter competition and dependence on China.
