As a leading manufacturing industry of VTM and/or COVID related products, we opine that the government support and interventions helped us scale to meet the rising demands during the critical period of pandemic. More importantly, domestic manufactures were not only able to supply rising demands but were also able to serve worldwide demands of pandemic essentials; including but not limited to personal protective equipment, viral transport media, etc. Thus, it can be proudly said that for the Indian manufacturing industry and under make it India campaign; the pandemic turned out to be an opportunity in this particular segment of the manufacturing industry. It is now the time to remove all previous digressive policies for which we were relying heavily on imports for essential supplies.

We are currently at the cusp of great opportunities due to multiple reasons, one of them can be the global ban on Chinese products, and the second being the current Indian policy associated with public procurement. Moreover, due to supportive geopolitical reasons, global investors are heading towards India showing renewed interest in establishing manufacturing setups.

Our government has also decided to make the most of it and has initiated multiple policies, to promote huge foreign investments from diverse sectors. Due to this, India is gradually paving up its path towards becoming one of the most open economies; with an intent to remove all the major roadblocks and to offer tailor-made solutions for making India a manufacturing hub.

With great support from our Prime Minister Mr. Narendra Modi, we are gradually becoming the manufacturing superpower of the globe; with enhanced ability and productivity. In the pre-COVID era, the manufacturing capacity of in vitro diagnostic products in India was roughly around 0 to 8, which is increased to around 1.47 billion pc/annum; while that of VTM kits is around 3.77 billion/annum.

However, it is very interesting to note that recently there has been an increase in the important tariffs imposed by India; as a part of the “Make in India” initiative. This latest development has disturbed the opportunity of India to be the world leader.

Having said that it is very imperative to understand that technology is a key to revolutionize our production process more smartly. The economic recovery, especially in the post-COVID time, remains largely uncertain and to some extent, it will be determined by the viable manufacturing sector with the implementation of technological advancements.