India expedites activities for establishing the Pharma Hub in Sri Lanka
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- Published on Thursday, 16 August 2012 16:17
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India is to establish a pharmaceutical manufacturing hub in Sri Lanka. In this connection, an Indian Pharma delegation headed by representatives from Pharmexcil, India’s powerful promoter of $10 billion pharmaceutical exports arrived in Colombo on Wednesday.
The Pharmexcil team, the largest of its kind to arrive in Sri Lanka in the country’s trade history, arrived as a result of the directive of Indian Minister of Industry, Commerce and Textiles Anand Sharma. During the recent high level Indian trade delegation to Colombo led by Minister Sharma, India announced that a special Indian pharmaceutical delegation will be arriving in Colombo to set up the proposed pharmaceutical manufacturing hub in Sri Lanka.
Minister of Industry and Commerce Rishad Bathiudeen said that Sri Lanka warmly welcomes this delegation and is ready to provide all the support needed by them. He said that the arrival of pharma hub delegation from India in such a short period shows Minister Sharma’s sincerity to implement the proposed pharma hub in Sri Lanka and to increase bilateral trade levels.
The Minister said that in addition to this delegation, another team of reps from 20 Indian pharma firms are also arriving to take part in the forthcoming Arogya 2012 International Healthcare Exhibition to be held from 17 to 19 August at BMICH. He said that the Indian Pharmexcil led delegation has strategically timed their visit to co-incide with Arogya 2012 at BMICH, showing their keenness on implementation of the pharma hub without delay.
Sri Lanka and India have jointly appointed a high level Bilateral Task Force to implement the Indian proposals to increase bilateral trade to $10 billion by 2015 from current levels of $5 billion. Among the proposals to boost the trade levels are to set up a Pharmaceutical Manufacturing Hub in Sri Lanka. (niz+)
