The pharmaceutical companies of Pakistan have expressed keen interest to produce raw material of different life-saving drugs for the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia (FDRE) by investing in its health sector.
The interest was shown by a delegation of the pharmaceutical industry during a meeting with Ambassador Ethiopia Jemal Beker Abdula at his office on Wednesday.
The delegation, led by President of the Islamabad Chamber of Commerce and Industry Ahsan Zafar Bakhtawari, included former president of ICCI Zafar Bakhtawari, ICCI Executive Member Shaukat Hayat Khan, ICCI Defence Sub Committee Convener Zahid maqbool and representative of different pharmaceutical companies.
“Pakistan can offer best quality medicines to Ethiopia at par with the international standards as well as on affordable rates,” said the head of a pharmaceutical firm who added that his company was producing 300 different brands of life saving drugs.
He said Pakistan was a $3.2 billion market for pharmaceutical with an annual growth rate of about 18 per cent. “Despite of all the odds, our industry market size is growing as we are exporting (our products) to 65 countries including Africa, Central Asian states and others.
A representative of another company based in the twin cities said there was a big cluster of pharmaceutical manufacturers in the twin cities of Rawalpindi and Islamabad. “Our company is producing more than 150 life saving drugs and also interested in doing business in Africa especially, Ethiopia.”
Ambassador Jemal Beker said the products produced by Pakistan’s pharmaceutical industry had a good reputation in the world, but unfortunately could not get access to the market of Ethiopia due to absence of institutional linkages.
