By Beatrice Bangula

Blantyre, October 3, Mana: Minister of Trade and Industry, Sosten Gwengwe on Thursday toured pharmaceuticals, Pharmavova Malawi Limited in Blantyre where he said government is committed to support local manufacturers amidst economic situations where only a few pharmaceutical companies are remaining.

Gwengwe said for government to move forward, there is a need to pay more attention to local manufacturers in line with the Malawi Vision 2063 agenda.

“We should stop thinking that Malawi needs to be importing Aspirin or Panado. We need to build our pharmaceutical industry so that once we capacitate it with the local market it should grow big,

“One day we should be talking of Malawi producing a vaccine for viruses and in this regard, we cannot ignore the pharmaceutical industry,” he added.

The Minister said government, medical stores and other stakeholders need to work together to ensure that the Buy Malawi Strategy (MBS) becomes a reality and doing so could encourage local medicine producers to do more and satisfy the market.

“We have the Buy Malawi Strategy and within it, there is also the Buy Malawi Pharmaceutical chapter and there is a whole section that deals with how to procure locally.

“We used to have six vibrant producers in this sector but we are now remaining with two or three medicine producers,” he added.

He therefore called on government institutions to look into ways of promoting the pharmaceutical industry in line with development aspirations outlined in the Malawi Vision 2063.

“We really should pay attention because we do not want a situation where we have nobody producing even aspirin in a country of 20 plus million Malawians. This will not be a good situation for our country,” Gwengwe said.

Pharmanova Malawi Limited, Quality Assurance Manager, Tawanda Musasa said is impressed with government’s commitment towards local pharmaceuticals, adding that local manufacturers look forward to the government’s support.

He said government support in the pharmaceutical industry will help to create more job opportunities as the industry grows.

" We can produce 4.4 billion tablets, 207 million capsules, 27 million sachets of dry powder, 11 million units of liquid orals for non-beta lactam products,’ he added.

Musasa said Pharmavova Malawi Limited can do more to satisfy the market.