India's pharma, meditech exports expected to sustain momentum despiteglobal slowdown: Report

Exports of India's pharmaceutical and meditech sectors are expected to sustain the growth momentum in the ongoing fiscal despite a slowdown in the global economy, a senior government official said on Wednesday.

With the government revving up support for drug development in India, as many as 16 blockbuster molecules targeted for a wide range of therapeutic areas, including cancer, diabetes, HIV and tuberculosis, are in the pipeline to be produced in India, Department of Pharmaceuticals, Secretary Arunish Chawla told reporters on the sidelines of CII Pharma and Life Sciences summit here.

"We have been analysing the export trends in the recent data. Even though there is a general slowdown in exports globally, the good news is that the Indian pharmaceuticals, biotech, and bulk drug exports have grown double-digit over the last year," he said in response to a query on export prospects of the pharma industry amid a global slowdown.

He further said,"In the first four months of this year, these exports have now become the fourth largest merchandise export item for the Indian economy.  That's a huge achievement, and it's an important milestone that has been crossed."

Going forward, Chawla said,"We expect robust performance from both pharma and the meditech industry. In the last year, in the consumables and surgical space we became an export-oriented industry. In other segments as well, like imaging devices, body implants, in-vitro diagnostics, we are a rising power, and these exports are also showing a good growth this year."

Bullish on India's pharma and meditech exports, he said,"We are confident that when the data comes finally for the current financial year, you will see impressive results for yourself."

On support of drug development in India, he said,"We've done both studies and applied research to identify blockbuster molecules and blockbuster drugs in the traditional pharma space and in the new rising biotech and biosimilar space."

He further said,"Patent cliff studies recently identified 26 blockbuster molecules, of these 16 are in the pipeline. They're going to be produced in India. They are in various stages of approvals and manufacturing licences."

While he did not elaborate on the name of the companies which are developing these drugs, Chalwa said,"These are mostly Indian companies, and they are taking help from the PLI scheme, the incentives to develop, research, take clinical trials and get the necessary approvals for these blockbuster molecules."

These molecules are both small and large molecules aimed at most therapeutic segments including, cancer, diabetes, tuberculosis, HIV and anticoagulants, among others, he added.

The Drugs Controller General of India (DCGI) has already granted approvals to some of the molecules, Chawla said, adding, "going further, we would also be working on their value chains upstream the way we have focused on bulk drugs as upstream value chains of chemical entities."

He further said the government is also now focusing on the upstreams of biological entities, which particularly includes basic molecules like amino acids, nucleotides and vaccine raw materials.

"You will see a lot of work taking place in this direction going forward.  We are also working on facilitating the cell and gene therapies and healthcare ecosystems that will come up going forward," Chawla said.