The Pharmaceutical Advisory Forum, an official platform of all the stakeholders and consumers in the pharmaceutical sector under the Ministry of Chemicals and Fertilisers, will be revamped and expanded by including more members from the non-governmental and consumer organisations.

Instead of the earlier number of 30 members, to be nominated into the body, now the Department of Pharmaceuticals will nominate 60 members representing the NGOs and the consumer organisations, with a view to give adequate weight to the public interest organisations, according to a notice by the DoP.

All other conditions, regarding the constitution of the Advisory Forum will remain the same as per the earlier notification issued in 2009, in this regard. The Forum, to be headed by the Union Minister for Chemicals and Fertilisers as the chairman and the Union Minister of State for Chemicals as the co-chairman, will be constituted soon, sources said.

The forum will have two members from each of the pharma industry associations like IDMA, BDMA, OPPI, IPA, CIPI, FICCI, FOPE, SPIC, ASSOCHAM and CII. Earlier there was only one member from each of the association. There will be also ten members from chemists associations.

The forum was constituted on July 2004, with more than 160 members, as a platform of all the stakeholders related to the sector to make good quality essential pharmaceuticals of mass consumption available at reasonable prices.

The decision to reconstitute the forum was announced in June 2009, but was yet to be made. As per the official sources, the Forum has held four meetings so far from the time of its inception, twice in 2006 and once each in 2007 and 2008 in Delhi. The forum meetings played a vital role in policy discussions related to pharmaceutical price regulations, price regulation of imported patented products, promotion of affordable medicines through generic drug stores, etc.