Skilled manpower shortage for new drugs plagues India

India is facing a severe shortage of people with specialised skills for developing new drugs and may try to rope in consultants of local origin overseas to help domestic firms to tide over the problem, Biocon Chairman and Managing Director Kiran Mazumdar Shaw said here.

"The biggest challenge we have is how do we get specialised skills and expertise," she added. "For doing generics, it's fine (we don't have manpower shortage), but for making new products, it's very difficult to get personnel. We don't have enough of them," she added.

Biotech institutes in the country are being encouraged to address this issue, and there was also a suggestion to bring in people of Indian origin from overseas and employ them as consultants and experts to improve the situation, she said.

Meanwhile, the Indian biotech sector is doing well and is growing at the rate of 30-40 per cent every year. It is expected to grow from over $2 billion at present to $5 billion by 2010, Shaw said.

The sector has achieved "critical mass" in certain sectors such as bio-pharmaceuticals. Currently, India is the world's largest producer of vaccines and may soon become the "bio-manufacturing" country, as well as the "clinical hub" of the world, she added.

However, Shaw said, the agri-biotech products were facing some problem due to regulatory obstacles and the government needs to do something in that area.