KARACHI, July 11: Speakers at a seminar on Friday urged the Pakistani pharmaceutical companies to adopt good manufacturing, storage and laboratory practices so that the locally-produced medicines could be exported in large numbers.

Speaking at the seminar organized by the federal health ministry, in collaboration with the World Health Organization, they said whenever standards were compromised questions were raised not only about the performance of the Pakistani manufacturers but also about those of the government officials.

The speakers said if the Pakistani manufacturers wanted to export medicines to the United States or the EU countries, they must meet the stringent standards formulated by organizations such as the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). They pointed out that the FDA could warn the manufacturers, even arrest them, if standards were compromised consistently.

On the occasion Noman Saigal, the adviser to the Sindh’s chief minister on health, urged the pharmaceutical companies to coordinate their activities and try to learn from one another’s experiences.

He said the authorities were ready to solve the manufacturers’ problems. The high officials’ doors were open for all, he said.

Mr Saigal said the government wanted to see the quality of the Pakistani medicines improved considerably. He said the government officials must remain vigilant when it came to floating and opening of tenders.

The CM’s adviser announced that the records of all the state-owned hospitals would be scrutinized soon so that wrongdoing could be detected in procurement of medicines. Mr Saigal said no official and no manufacturer, if found to be involved in wrongdoing, would be spared.

Maj Gen (retd) M. Aslam, the director general of health, in his speech claimed that the ministry of health in its policy had encouraged self-sufficiency in medicines. The ministry wanted to strengthen the national pharmaceutical industry.

The supply of medicines to the masses at affordable prices was a cornerstone of the government’s policy, he declared.

In his presentation, Mohammad Aslam, a technical manager at one of the pharmaceutical companies, said standards formulated by various international organizations were being merged. As a result, Good Manufacturing Practices as we see today were going to be transformed radically.

He said systems were available with the help of which continuous monitoring of the manufacturing processes was possible. These systems were more efficient when compared to the old system in which some batches and samples were tested randomly.

Mr Aslam said the new systems for continuous manufacturing led to fewer rejects and therefore lesser wasted dollars. Under these, problems were solved before they could interfere with the quality of the products.

Dr Amir Rauf spoke on the use of computers in the quality assurance process. He described in detail the shortcomings of the local manufacturers.

Dr Farzana Chaudhry also spoke.