Union chemicals, fertilizers and pharmaceuticals minister Anantha Kumar announcement that the Katoch Committee report has been placed before the Cabinet for approval has evoked a guarded response from the pharma industry.

With the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) mooting for a dedicated ministry for pharmaceuticals and medical devices, the need of the hour was to ensure every effort was made for the pharma industry to succeed in a conducive and transparent working environment. Favourable policies like for infrastructure, taxation, and incentives are on the cards, said minister Kumar at the 67th Indian Pharmaceutical Congress inauguration at Mysuru.

The Katoch Committee report on active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) is now before the Cabinet and the PMO has been urged to take it up on priority, he stated.

Industry representatives have expressed surprise and stated that a few recommendations of the Katoch Committee required clarifications. In this regard, various industry associations submitted their views because they viewed that the report largely focused on large API units. “The small and medium enterprises are apprehensive about the cluster development initiative by the Union government for the APIs. The main worry is that government is looking at setting up clusters in inaccessible regions. It would cause transport and logistics pressures leading to losing out on cost efficiencies and keeping up delivery timelines.”

“The government will now need to put in place a mechanism for the SMEs to get the full benefit of the Katoch Committee report on APIs. In fact, it is the SMEs that are the backbone of the pharma industry manufacturing landscape and therefore they cannot be ignored, Dr. Subhash C Mandal, assistant director, Directorate of Drugs Control, government of West Bengal and president, Indian Pharmaceutical Association Bengal Branch told Pharmabiz.

Last week the Indian Pharmaceutical Association has communicated to the Union government that while it insisted for the speedy execution of Katoch Committee report, it has emphasized for assistance to Brownfield projects and bulk drugs manufactured through intermediates that are not imported among others requirements.

Ananth Kumar pointed that when Indian pharma accounted for every third tablet exported to global markets, its high quality contents were for prime importance. India has been exporting to all the 200 countries in the world and accounted for the highest USFDA audited plants.

Further, the minister propagated the maxim of 3As : authenticity, availability and affordability for the pharma industry to continue to strive to make a mark in the global and national arena. Efforts from the government are on to bring all the 18 therapeutic areas including cardiac, diabetes, respiratory, dermatology, hypertension, AIDS/HIV to be included into the DPCO basket for poor patients in the country.

Stating that the pharma industry had a big role to play in the area of health security, minister Ananth Kumar pointed out that by following the rule of 3Ds: drug discovery, bulk drugs and medical devices, the sector will now need to move towards new engineering than re-engineering of drugs, work to bring down imports of bulk drugs from the current 60 per cent and adopt the concept of clusters and parks to bring down cost of product of medical devices by 30 per cent. Only if these sectors are brought under one roof, they could maximise the advantage of effluent treatment plants and power cost to save on manufacturing expenses.