China's Pharmacy Sector to Explore New Ways for WTO Entry

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Tuesday, December 04, 2001

China's Pharmacy Sector to Explore New Ways for WTO Entry

China's WTO accession will bring about severe challenges to the domestic pharmacy sector, said medicine experts at a seminar which closed in Beijing Monday. To meet the challenges domestic medicine manufacturers are urged to improve product quality by structural adjustment and techonological innovation so as to sharpen their competitive edge on international markets.

Traditional Chinese Medicine, Modern International Culture

Seminar held to promote China's pharmaceutical industry

China's WTO accession will bring about severe challenges to the domestic pharmacy sector, said medicine experts at a seminar which closed here Monday.

At the seminar entitled "China Medicine Economic Forum", experts discussed the way for China's pharmaceutical enterprises to survive the adverse circumstances following China's entry into WTO (World Trade Organization).

They considered that the domestic medicine manufacturers must speed up the structural adjustment and give full attention to both their scale enlargement and technology enhancement, so as to bring their advantages into better performance in future's competition.

Large gap exists between home and overseas pharmaceutical factories

Many of the participants at the forum thought that there exists a large gap between China's pharmaceutical factories and their overseas counterparts either in capital and fund, or in technological development, or in market control ability.

The competition between the Chinese pharmacy sector and its foreign counterpart is compared to "the rivalry between yacht and aircraft carrier", the experts said, adding that the former must quicken step in strength building up.

In 2000, the medicine manufacturers ranking the top ten in the world reported a sales volume accounting for about 47 percent of the global medicine industry.

The entry into Chinese markets of these pharmaceutical tycoons is just like "fish back to water" due to their comprehensive agency systems covering most of the major markets in the world, said the experts.

Besides, about 97 percent of the Chinese-made medicine and raw medicine made in China are somewhat copy of those made in the developed countries.

With China's newly WTO entry the implementation of regulations on intellectual property protection will forbid the random replication of foreign patented medicine, which will be a great challenge to China's national pharmaceutical industry.

Domestic enterprises urged to unite together and speed up innovation

Yu Mingde, an official with the State Trade and Economic Commission, said the domestic pharmacy should shift its production style from relying mainly on replication to that combining replication and innovation.

The Chinese pharmaceutical companies should step up development of new medicine to prepare more products with advanced technologies for the new run of global competition, Yu said.

Liu Cunzhou, president of Harbin Pharmaceutical Group, said China's domestic powerful medicine manufacturers should unite together, which will favor the rational distribution of resources.

Liu said, the home enterprises that take the dominant place should actively expand their scale at a low cost through reorganization, or annexation and purchase of other small companies caught in unfavorable operations.

Having its own superiority, China is confident in meeting WTO challenges

Participants all considered that the domestic medicine industry still has its own superiority in the future competition.

Li Jie, president of Hubei Yiyao Pharmaceutical Group, said China now can produce over 1,400 among all the 2,000 kinds of the chemical material medicine. China's WTO entry will further promote the export of the material medicine.

In addition, after China's entry into WTO, the domestic medicine administration system must conform to the international regulations, and China's national pharmaceutical enterprises have to improve product quality and market competitiveness, Li said.

The forum, jointly held by China Pharmaceutical Administration Association, Chinese Pharmaceutical Association and Beijing Candle Business Consulting Company, was organized to promote China's pharmaceutical industry.

backgrounder

China Revamps Traditional Medicine to Meet Global Standards

China is putting an emphasis on global standards in the production of herbal medicine and strengthening technological innovations.

The nation's largest conglomerate of traditional Chinese medicine businesses, the China Medicinal Materials Group was set up on May 21, indicating a shakeup in the industrial landscape.

The group, formed by a number of leading Chinese manufacturers, distributors and innovators of traditional Chinese medicine, shows the country's ambition to have an industrial giant competing on the world stage.

China also revised its law on drug administration, the latest but boldest effort ever to tighten the grip on medicine production and supervision.

The updated law strengthens supervision and keeps a closer eye on the whole process of manufacturing drugs as well as monitoring their quality, underscoring China's bid to ensure production goes by global rules.

At the same time, Chinese government is strengthening its financial support of technological innovation in the traditional Chinese medicine sector. This has become one of the key issues on the agenda for China's high-tech innovation plan over the next five years.

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