By IANS,
New Delhi : India is fast emerging as a hub for biotech products and the pharma industry is growing rapidly as a result of the government’s policy initiatives, Health Minister Anbumani Ramadoss said Monday.
“Today, as a result of our policy initiatives and the economic policy of our government, the pharmaceutical industry is growing a rate of 10-15 percent annually and is poised to grow at a faster rate,” Ramadoss said at the inauguration of the Food and Drugs Administration Bhavan here.
The building, a World Bank assisted project designed for strengthening and upgrading the infrastructure and building capacity of personnel in the food and drug sector, was inaugurated by External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee.
Ramadoss said biopharmaceutical products and clinical research are also witnessing rapid growth.
According to him, good infrastructure and availability of scientific, technical and skilled manpower are making India not only a safe but a favourite destination for pharma companies for clinical research.
“Currently the size of the pharma industry is estimated at more than Rs.60,000 crore (Rs.600 billion) and India is fast emerging as a hub for pharma and biotech products,” he added.
Expressing concern about the changing disease pattern owing to shifting lifestyle and food habits, Ramadoss said they have recently made it mandatory to notify nutritional labelling of the packaged food articles.
According to this notification, it has been made mandatory to display the quantity of carbohydrate, protein, energy and fat in packaged food items besides declaration of other nutritional facts.
“This measure, I am sure would raise considerable awareness among the consumers, particularly the youth in the choice of food,” he said.
He said the government had set up the Food Safety and Standards Authority, an autonomous body, which would set standards for different food articles and would implement the newly enacted integrated food law, Food Safety and Standards Act-2006.
At the moment many ministries are involved and the minister hoped a single authority would help.