The Confederation of Indian Pharmaceuticals Industries (CIPI), the apex organisation of small-scale sector drug manufacturers in the country, is planning to appoint a liaison officer at its New Delhi headquarters to better the services to its members.

The officer will co-ordinate work on behalf of the members with the various government offices related to drug control administration, ministry of health and family welfare, SSI ministry, agencies like Chemexcil etc., said TS Jaishankar, chairman of CIPI.

Since the members of CIPI were spread in different parts of the country and attached to various pharmaceutical manufacturers associations in their respective states, it was necessary to have a full time officer in charge on behalf of the association to look after their affairs.

Besides, most of the office bearers of the association were from different parts of the country and being full time business personnel, it was imperative to rope in the services of professionals to interact with various offices and industry associations on behalf of various state PMAs and CIPI.

The liaison officer would pool necessary information resources and would interact with the concerned departments related to a host of national and state level issues related to SSI drug makers like clauses of Schedule M implementation, source of funding to implement Schedule M, mandate on WHO-GMP certification for government drug supply etc., said Jaishankar.

He also said CIPI would appoint secretarial staff in Chennai where the chairman's office is located to further speed up activities of the organisation. CIPI was in the process of appointing GMP consultants in each of the four zones, based at Chennai for South India, Delhi for North, Mumbai for West and Indore for Central Zone to help its members speedily implement the Schedule M norms. The consultant for South Zone has been almost finalised.

The members could access their service for the whole year by paying an amount of Rs 10,000 to the association. The association would also appoint product development experts and finance consultants to guide the SSI units to face the imminent challenges to the SSI industry, said Jaishankar.