Economic Highlights
New Delhi, 25 April 2022
Heal In India
AYUSH’S BILLION $ MARKET
By Shivaji Sarkar
India is leading a global healthcare radical
transformation. It is reimaging critical unhindered access to everyone through
an array of traditional medicines by setting up a World Health Organsiation centre,
which is likely to generate billions of dollars of business.
This generates hope for a crisis-ridden
economy having over 14 per cent wholesale inflation. Gujarat will not be known
only for the visit of UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who is paving the way
for a large defence-related deal, but also for establishing a new kind of
medicinal, healthcare and yoga, Ayush excellence business. The potential in the sector is immense, according to a US
Global Industry Analysis on Herbal Medicines – Global Herbal Market Trajectory
and Analytics. Estimates so far that it shall grow to $430.05 billion by
2028 at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 11.32 per cent.
The healthcare sector may be different by
2030, as both the WHO and India are to usher in a change for a people-centric
system of traditional medicines or grandma’s prescription. It may revolutionise
the pharmaceutical industry and the way the world uses medicines. Importantly,
it can make India an international
competitor with a surge in its medicinal exports and healing concept. Hope
emerges as the country leads this initiative with Prime Minister Narendra Modi
and WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanon Ghebreyesus inaugurating the $250
million WHO-funded Global Centre for Traditional Medicine at Jamnagar, Gujarat.
They give it a further push with the
simultaneous first Global Ayush Investment and Innovation Summit 2022 in
Gandhinagar, Gujarat. It witnessed Letter of Intents (LoIs) worth more than Rs 9000
crore in major categories such as FMCG, medical value travel (Heal in India),
pharma, technology & diagnostic and farmers & agriculture. Five
significant MoUs were signed with Argentina, Brazil, Mexico, Canada, the Philippines
for research and new academia and one with Ministry of Defence for promoting
Ayush in cantonments.
Modi
presented Rosemary Odinga, daughter of former Kenyan Prime Minister Raola
Odinga, for regaining her vision, lost in 2017, as the grand success of
ayurveda, which has created a $18 billion export market during the last few
years. The new Ayush visa introduced for Heal in India will create a concept of
wellness that encompasses healing through not only just medicine. It gives a
holistic approach of different foods and yogic practices to heal the body and
mind as appropriate food prepares one for a preventive care through healthy
lifestyle.
As
healthy plant-based ‘meat’ products are to replace the animal products for a
healthy lifestyle, the expansion of the sector can only be imagined now says
WHO D-G adding, “India will go to the world and the entire world will come to
India”.
Start-ups,
entrepreneurs, unicorns and industry and integrative medicine will increase
investment for innovations in Ayush. This success can create 5.5 lakh jobs,
Minister for Ayush Sarbanand Sonowal estimates and help farmers barge into a
novel high-earning propositions.
It is a WHO concern which found that the
traditionally used herbal plants or leaves like that of Giloi, Tulsi, haldi
(turmeric), dalchini-cardamom or honey could counter the severity of
the pandemic in a number of places. During the pandemic, the WHO observed that
the usage of various kinds of herbs met the global shortage of synthetic
medicines. The occurrence of such consumer preferences were seen more in the
Asian region. Herbal tea, coriander, turmeric, cumin and garlic were
extensively used to counter 100 to 700 per cent of rise in medicine demands.
The WHO observes that the alternate medicine
people used created a curative system beyond its imagination. “For many
millions of people around the world, traditional medicine is the first port of
call to treat many diseases,” says Dr Ghebreyesus. “Ensuring all people have
access to safe and effective treatment is an essential part of WHO’s mission,
and this new center will help to harness the power of science to strengthen the
evidence base for traditional medicine. We look forward to making it a
success.”
The world is now rediscovering the importance
of India’s traditional medicinal systems in Ayurveda, Siddha, Unani, Sowarigpa,
Homoeopathy and yoga. The effort is to make all of this relevant, even
fashionable in use today. In the process, it is even gaining the confidence to
project and export these around the world. As the GCTM is supposed to
coordinate world activities in such medicines and therapy it may promote
studies in Latin America, Africa, elsewhere in Asia and rest of the world. This
facility is intended to be a global repository of traditional healthcare
knowledge.
Sonowal says that this will change not only
healthcare but also alter the approach to India’s role in the world’s
traditional medicine business. Between 2019 and 20 exports surged 45 per cent. The market for medical
plants in India stood at Rs. 4.2 billion ($56.6 million) in
2019 and is expected to increase at a CAGR 38.5 per cent to Rs. 14 billion
(US $188.6 million) by 2030.
The
export value of ayurvedic and herbal products amounted to about $539 million
from India in 2021.The total world herbal trade is currently assessed at
$120 billion. Overall Ayush exports have reached to $18 billion from $3 billion
before 2014. The cultivation of the medicinal herbs such
as shankhapushpi, atis,
kuth, kutki, kapikachhu and karanja is changing the Indian agrarian
ayurvedic scenes and would empower the farmers with high
incomes.
There is a huge gap between the
supply and demand of medicinal plants to manufacture Ayurvedic medicines in
India. According to the ‘All India Trade Survey of Prioritised Medicinal
Plants, 2019’, demand for high-value medicinal plants increased by 50 per cent,
while the availability declined by 26 per cent. This led to an increased
habitat degradation and levels of over-exploitation by pharmaceutical
industries. Road development work and destruction of flora and fauna in the
Himalayas and remote areas also led to decreasing the availability of 65
species (10 per cent of the total) falling into the critically endangered,
vulnerable, and nearly threatened categories.
The GCTM would study the ways to
improve it; train farmers adopt technology and a possible new development
protocol. The concerted effort is to pave way for the growth of the sector and
create a sense for wellness of health and the Indian economy.---INFA
(Copyright,
India News & Feature Alliance)
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