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Bulawayo Bureau
ONE of Zimbabwe’s leading pharmaceutical and healthcare products manufacturers, Datlabs, says it has completed refurbishing its Belmont pharmaceutical plant at a cost of US$4,5 million.
However, the company’s chief executive officer, Mr Todd Moyo, said the most of the planned projects had since been discontinued owing to obtaining foreign currency shortages.
“We have successfully installed all the machines that we purchased for the upgrade. We have also installed a new Heat, Ventilation and Air Conditioning system (HVAC system) and done other civil works to improve the manufacturing environment and comply with the required international standards.
“We continue to bring in additional modern laboratory equipment to help in our processes and compliance with pharmaceutical standards,” he said.
The Bulawayo-headquartered company started the rehabilitation of its Belmont pharmaceutical plant two years ago.
“The new machinery has increased our capacity and efficiencies to produce various products, but sadly, this has come at a time when demand in the market has markedly slowed down, but we will benefit once the economic situation improves,” said Mr Moyo.
Last year, the company also installed major components of its new highly automated pharmaceutical tablet press machine.
The foreign currency crunch, he added, was working against the company’s planned upgrade.
Mr Moyo said: “The difficulties in sourcing the necessary foreign currency continue to affect our upgrade plans. We are always looking for developments that can improve our efficiencies and expand our product range.
“We will embark on our next major project as soon as the economic situation allows us to do so.
“We unfortunately need quite a sizeable amount of foreign currency for the project, but at the moment, we are not even getting enough to maintain the production of our current products.”
Datlabs, however, continues to engage the authorities to map the best way forward.
In 2018, Government pledged to assist the company to rehabilitate its IV (Intravenous) fluids manufacturing plant — which has been mothballed for the past 20 years — in the wake of the cholera outbreak.
About US$2 million is needed for the exercise.
According to Mr Moyo, the pharmaceutical industry is also plagued by low consumer demand and volatility of the newly introduced local currency.
“Falling consumer demand, depreciation of the currency and scarcity of same in the formal markets combined with soaring inflation and negative economic growth have affected our performances.
“The pharmaceutical industry as a whole imports most of its raw materials and is dependent on the availability of foreign currency, which sadly is very scarce, and that has affected output.
“We are one industry which imports inputs to manufacture for the local market and to a limited extent the export market,” he said.
The pharmaceutical industry is capital intensive as players are expected to continuously conform to international standards.
The coronavirus outbreak, which is affecting global supply chains, is also likely to affect local industry as it depends on some of the affected countries for the supply of strategic raw materials and spares.
Online Reporter