New Delhi: Secretary Department of Pharmaceuticals Ministry of Chemical and Fertilizers Dr Arunish Chawla on Tuesday informed that the plant for the production of Clavulanic Acid to make Augmentin which is used to treat various bacterial infections will start soon.
She said, " Production Linked Incentive scheme for bulk drugs and under that scheme, huge investment has come in, and Penicillin G and Clavulanic would now be manufactured in India. Hopefully these plants will be commissioned and inaugurated soon."
"Half the antibiotics in the market are beta lactam antibiotics. They are basically based on Penicillin G and Clavulanic acid. These are core or key drug intermediates, key starting materials.
They are also called bulk drugs. We used to manufacture them at one time, but we lost it to foreign competition." she added.
"We are very happy to announce that the PLI, or the Production linked incentive scheme for bulk drugs has been a success and under that scheme, huge investment has come in, and Penicillin G and Clavulanic would now be made in India," she further stated.
The secretary said that last year India had achieved trade balance in the export and import of bulk drugs.
"In India, bulk drugs should be seen on an aggregate basis.
Last year, we achieved trade balance, which means we exported as many bulk drugs as we imported, but certain molecules continue to be imported from one particular country, which means import concentration that potentially could disrupt supply chains when the time comes", Chawla said.
"We need to diversify the value chains for these critical bulk drugs. The PLI scheme has provided incentive so that manufacturing on key starting materials for antibiotics can happen in India, and that's going to commence very soon," she added.
Penicillin G and Clavulanic Acid are key ingredients in the antibiotic Augmentin and the commissioning of the plant will thereby reduce India's dependency on China. (with Agency inputs)
