The department of Ayush has given approval for two more ayurveda clusters, one each in Maharashtra and Orissa taking the total number of clusters to five in the country. The Ayush department is planning to establish a total of 25 ayurveda clusters in the country.

According to sources, the Ayush department has given approval to one more cluster in Maharashtra at Kokan and another cluster at Ganjam in Orissa. The department had earlier approved two clusters at Pune and Nashik in Maharashtra and one at Thrissur in Kerala.

The cluster project is part of the government's efforts to assist the ayurveda drug manufacturers to meet the quality standards. Under the project, common manufacturing, testing and marketing facilities will be set up. The clusters will be useful to the ayurveda manufacturers, especially the small and medium manufacturers who cannot afford to establish costly advanced facilities on their own, as there will be all types of common facilities in the clusters. With the government shifting its focus on quality, the clusters will go a long way in upgrading the quality of ayurveda products in the country.

The common manufacturing facilities, which will be established in the cluster included common tablet coating machines, extraction machines and packaging machines like blister packing and strip packing. The common testing facilities included common identification testing and qualitative testing. There will be advanced technological facilities for analysing the products such as gas chromatographers, HPTLC, and atomic absorption machines for heavy metal testing.

Besides, there will be common facilities for conducting stability testing, shelf-life study and toxicological study in the cluster. There will also have a common effluent disposal plant in the cluster.

Under the project, there should be a minimum of 15 manufacturers to form a cluster. The project will be funded by government grant, promoters and bank loans. The cluster in Nasik will be established at an estimated cost of Rs 7.3 crore and of which the department of Ayush will provide Rs 4.21 crore. The promoters, the manufacturers, have to collect Rs 1.20 crore and the rest will be taken as term loan from a bank. Details of other clusters are being worked out by the promoters.