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Herald Reporter
Construction of the state-of-the art warehouse for the National Pharmaceutical Company (NatPharm) in Harare is progressing well, with completion expected well ahead of schedule.
In an interview yesterday, acting Natpharm managing director Mr Roland Mlalazi said the engineers on site were working hard and staff houses and offices had already been completed within the same grounds.
“Construction is progressing well and just two weeks ago we had a progress meeting with officials from the Local Government, Public Works and National Housing Ministry from which remarkable progress was noted,” he said.
Looking ahead, Mr Mlalazi did not foresee any major problems.
“With the way they (contractors) are working on the ground, we anticipate completion to be ahead of schedule, maybe six months ahead,” said Mr Mlalazi.
Once complete, the project, which is a partnership between the Zimbabwe and Chinese governments, is meant to accommodate 22 000 pallets of medicines.
The existing structure accommodates only nine pallets.
Officially, construction which began in August this year is expected to be complete in two years.
Inherited from the Rhodesian government in 1980, the current warehouse is very small since it was meant for a few people and limited diseases, but now the disease burden has more than tripled and requires a much bigger facility.
The new warehouse is anticipated to make recording, storage and stock taking easy as everything would also be computerised as opposed to the current manual set-up.
NatPharm procures medicines and medical supplies for all public health institutions and mission hospitals in Zimbabwe.
Maintaining proper storage conditions for health commodities is vital to ensuring safety and quality.
The new warehouse is anticipated to adhere to World Health Organisation (WHO) and Medicines Control Authority of Zimbabwe (MCAZ) guidelines for storage of health commodities.
NatPharm has six warehouses in Harare, Bulawayo, Chinhoyi, Gweru, Masvingo and Mutare.
A new warehouse for Mutare is under construction with financial support from the Global Fund to Fight Aids, Tuberculosis and Malaria.
Online Reporter