Report Identifies Growth Trends in MENA Region

The key growth drivers for the MENA (Middle East and North Africa) region were forecasted at CPhI Istanbul earlier this month. The next five years will reportedly see more outsourcing, vaccine, biotech development and harmonization in region.

Overall, the report forecasts that third party manufacturing will expand in MENA as many companies do not want to have established assets everywhere. As a result, third party manufacturing is the preferred option for multinationals and SMEs looking to enter the market.

Experts warn however that for the region to reach its full potential, a number of changes and challenges needed to be overcome. Whilst manufacturing standards are now reaching cGMP, they are often not yet ready for EU or FDA approval. Additionally, the view is that some of the newer technologies are not available regionally, with a knock-on effect of reducing local sector experience.

This is now predicted to change as local and regional demand for medicines is increasing, as are regional healthcare budgets. As a result, with the economies’ gentrifying, consumer products will grow and antibiotics, cardiovascular and GI generics will remain the biggest products classes.

A CPhI Turkey pharma report(1) released at the event also stated that the Turkish pharma economy has grown by 15.6% in the last year to reach 15.9 billion lira.

(1) CPhI Istanbul 2016, the Sector Discovery: Turkey Pharma Industry Report of 2016