The Sri Lankan pharmaceutical industry will be able to reduce around 30% of total pharma imports by 2030 opined senior members of the Sri Lanka Chamber of the Pharmaceutical Industry. (SLCPI).
They said that one of the main reasons for this is the buyback guarantee that was presented by the government for pharma manufacturers. “This prompted many local companies to invest in Sri Lanka and today there is a very strong local supply in the market. Soon pharma exports too will take place.”
Today over 15% of the market is made of local manufacturing, a significant increase within the last 10 years. “Local manufacturing capacity is expected to increase to approximately 30% by 2030. The private pharmaceutical industry generates around 60,000 employment opportunities.”
They recalled that during the 1950’s Sri Lanka had a very strong pharma manufacturing base but due to nationalization many of the foreign firms were forced to move out to India, Bangladesh and Pakistan where they set up factories and now exports to Sri Lanka. Today the local pharma industry is worth USD 500 million, out of which 300 million is made up of the private sector and 200 million is the tender (government) sector. The pharma sector including both state and private generates Rs. 172.13 billion, out of which Rs. 129.13 billion is from the private sector. However local manufactures lament that over the last few years, price regulation in the sector has been conducted in an unpredictable and arbitrary manner, without meaningful consultation with the industry.
“Despite an equitable pricing mechanism bound to be prescribed in the NMRA Act, the NMRA has failed to define and stick to such a mechanism. Consequently, the industry has been unable to adjust prices to keep pace with the variations in the economy such as the depreciation of the Rupee.”
Relentless lowering of drug prices will result in better manufacturers withdrawing from the market, causing a detrimental impact on the public’s access to quality medicine.
“Hence we need the implementation of a transparent, consultative and predictable pricing mechanism for price-controlled medicines.”
Presently SLCPI has 64 members, who supply 85% of the local pharmaceutical market.
Shirajiv Sirimane