The Pharmaceuticals Export Promotion Council (Pharmexcil) has completed two years of its operations on May 12, 2006. The dynamic growth of Indian pharma industry, and the recommendations of four major pharma associations made the Ministry of Commerce & Industry to realize the need for separate export promotion council. Accordingly, Pharmaceuticals Export Promotion Council has been set up on May 12, 2004.

With its notification No 61 dated March 16, 2005, director general of Foreign Trade, India, made Pharmexcil the sole agency to issue RCMCs to all pharma exporters.

Dr PV Appaji, executive director of Pharmexcil said, in the two years the council has made its presence felt across the global pharma markets. One of the major achievements has been to support and boost pharmaceutical exports of small and medium pharma companies, which earlier did not receive deserved attention. Even big pharma companies have now realised that the council is for the betterment of the industry and are going hand in hand with all its initiatives.

Pharmexcil has been able to lead active industry delegations to various potential pharma markets across the world and also been able to attract regulatory, industry and trade delegations to India. Delegations from Korea, Africa, Libya and Tunisia have been a success in this direction. Pharmexcil has also stepped up its efforts to lead and participate in key industrial events in Moscow and Paris is planning for a delegation to European region. Pharmexcil is keen to establish close tie ups with countries like Poland, Hungary and other potential markets, he added.

Dr Appaji informed, Indian pharma industry manufactures over 400 APIs, over 10,000 formulations and meets up to 95 per cent of the domestic requirement. Total pharmaceuticals production is estimated to be about $ 8 billion and India today is among top five global producers of APIs.

India has the largest number of USFDA approved facilities outside the US. It has about 75 US FDA approved facilities, about 19 TGA (Australia) approved facilities, 45 MCA (South Africa) approved facilities and three EDQM (Europe) approved plants.

As of 2004-05, API exports account to about 7,780 crore registering a growth rate of about eight per cent compared to the previous year. India exports to about 220 countries and the top 20 countries constitute about 60 per cent of the pharmaceutical exports, he added.