Ease of Doing Business for MSMEs: In order to strengthen the supply chain of the pharmaceuticals industry, of which MSMEs are an integral part, the government will incentivise such businesses for getting Schedule M certification or Good Manufacturing Practice (GMO) certification by the World Health Organization.
Ease of Doing Business for MSMEs: The department of pharmaceuticals on Tuesday said Chemicals & Fertilizers and Health & Family Welfare Minister Mansukh Mandaviya will unveil multiple initiatives under the scheme Strengthening Pharmaceuticals Industry (SPI) on July 21 (Thursday) that address issues related to technology upgradation among MSMEs at unit level and cluster level. In a statement, the department noted that in order to strengthen the supply chain of the pharmaceuticals industry, of which MSMEs are an integral part, the government will incentivise such businesses for getting Schedule M certification or Good Manufacturing Practice (GMO) certification by the World Health Organization (WHO) through the sub-scheme Pharmaceuticals Industry Technology Upgradation Assistance Scheme (PTUAS).
GMP certification is a standard defined by WHO for ensuring products are produced and controlled as per the quality standards. MSMEs will have the option to choose from either capital subsidy or interest subvention to upgrade their production facilities as per WHO-GMP or Schedule-M standards.
At the cluster level, the sub-scheme under SPI ‘Assistance to Pharmaceuticals Industry for Common Facilities’ (APICF) would help set up common facilities like testing labs, common effluent treatment plants, etc., through government grant up to 70 per cent of the project and subject to a ceiling of a maximum of Rs 20 crore. Under the third sub-scheme Pharmaceutical & Medical Devices Promotion and Development Scheme (PMPDS), a series of awareness programs, sectoral studies and similar programs will be organised to generate soft inputs for policy advocacy, the government said.
The amount earmarked for three components of the Rs 500-crore five-year (FY22-FY26) SPI scheme is Rs 178 crore (APICF), Rs 300 crore (PTUAS), and Rs 21.5 crore (PMPDS). The guidelines for the scheme were launched in March this year.
The new scheme assumes importance as the domestic pharma market is expected to jump 3x this decade from $42 billion in 2021 to $65 billion by 2024 and further to around $120-130 billion by 2030, according to the Indian Economic Survey 2021. Moreover, according to IBEF, the Indian pharmaceutical sector supplies more than 50 per cent of the global demand for various vaccines. India ranks 3rd in terms of pharmaceutical production by volume and 14th by value and the domestic industry includes a network of 3,000 drug companies and around 10,500 manufacturing units.
