The Association of Medical Devices and Diagnostic Suppliers of India (AMDSI) has urged the central government to give a boost to the medical equipment and other medical technology manufacturing industry in the county by amending the existing provisions regarding the industry in the coming Union Budget.

AMDSI president GSK Velu told Pharmabiz that the Association has submitted memorandums to various ministries and were also in talks with the Union Finance and Commerce Ministries to include provisions in the budget that would promote indigenous manufacturing of medical equipments and other medical technology products in the country.

In the letter, the AMDSI had stressed to rationalize customs duty and settle the disparities in the duty for finished goods and raw materials, create medical technology parks in the country similar to the software technology parks and give them benefits and make it mandatory for multinational companies to set up manufacturing units in the country rather than just do trading in India.

Speaking about the rationalization in customs duty, Velu said, "There is a lot of expenditure that goes into the manufacturing in this sector. For instance, for importing raw materials for manufacturing a CT Scan machine in India, we have to pay customs duty, excise duty and VAT. So what happens is that instead of manufacturing the products in India, people go in for the finished products. But if the customs duty and other taxes are reduced, the equipments can be manufactured in India and invariably the price of the product will also come down."

Commenting on the issue of setting up medical technology parks in the country, Velu said that the Government should promote setting up medical equipment parks in the country and give income tax and other benefits, so that more and more Indian companies will start manufacturing medical equipments. "Technology is ruling healthcare and if the equipments are manufactured within India, the cost of healthcare will come down and the end consumer will benefit,"he said.

On the issue of asking the MNC's to set up manufacturing units in the country, Velu said MNCs are now trading in the country and reaping the benefits. The country is not getting any benefit from that. So, the government should bring an Act making it mandatory for the companies to set up manufacturing units within the country.

Citing the example of China, Velue said a few years back the situation was the same in China too. But things have changed now after they set up manufacturing units in the country thereby stopping the imports of finished goods. They are now a 10 billion dollar market and around 4 million dollar comes from export alone. "India should follow China's policy," he said.