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Indian pharma industry is facing an
acute shortage of gelatine, used for the manufacture of hard capsules,
soft gels, coated tablets, mini, micro capsules. The shortfall is
because gelatine makers have either faced closure of units due to labour
unrest, effluent issues and cyclone in December which damaged the plant
and material.
With the rising global prices, domestic gelatine
manufacturers are working to maximise the export orders. Now with the
depreciating rupee they will be able to earn substantial increase in
revenue by exporting the same. This is further aggravating the problem
of availability of gelatine in domestic market. The gelatine users are
facing high import duty of 20 per cent compared to 7.5 per cent on most
of the raw materials, and this makes it unviable to import gelatine.
These factors have led to gelatine prices to shoot up by almost 25 per
cent in last two months alone. For instance hard capsule grade of
gelatine, which was available at about Rs.280/- per kg in month of October, 2011, is now being sold at Rs.350-360/- per kg, stated industry souces.
Gelatine
is mainly used by pharma industry for manufacture of hard and soft
capsules. Hard capsule manufacturers resell their product to pharma
industry for further processing and marketing of the finished
formulations. Soft capsule industry manufacture their own formulations
using the gelatine.
Hard capsule manufacturers have been affected
badly due to this sudden increase in the cost of gelatine, as this is
the only major raw material for their product.
There are 15 units
engaged in the manufacture of capsule manufacturing using hard gelatine
and all of them are in serious trouble. The government can only help
them by way of reducing the import duty on gelatine.
For the
manufacture of a number of popular pharma products also, gelatine is
being used. These products are likely to be costly in view of severe
shortage of Gelatine in the country in recent months, stated experts.
Apart
from pharma industry wherein gelatine is used in the form of capsules,
or as a tablet binding material, it is also used in manufacture of
X-ray films, food industry (for jelly making), or as glue by many other
industries. It is manufactured by processing of animal bones.
Indiaâs
total installed gelatine production capacity of its nine units is
around 20,000 tonnes per year. Currently domestic consumption is
estimated at 10,000 tonnes of which 8,000 tonnes is used for the
production of hard gelatines and remaining 2,000 tomes for soft gel. The
country exports about 12,000 tonnes annually. Many of the users also
import about 1,500 tonnes of the same per year.
There are nine
manufacturers of Gelatine in India: Sterling Biotech, Baroda, Sterling
Biotech-Ooty, Narmada Gelatine Ltd, Jabalpur, Nitta Geltines Ltd, Kochi,
Raymon Gelatines Ltd, Baroda, India Gelatines Ltd, Vapi, Pioneer
Jellaice Ltd, Cuddalore, Rama Gelatines Ltd, Punjab, C J Gelatines Ltd.,
Bhopal.
In the production of soft gel, the use of gelatine is
lower compared to 50 percent of its content in hard capsules. Gelatine
users have drastically reduced the production by almost 50 per cent in
last three months thereby causing a severe shortage.
Users who
were importing gelatine have been forced to cut down their imports due
to drastic increase in international prices, and depreciation of Indian
Rupee since last few months. To fulfil their requirement they are
picking up the available material in the domestic market at higher
prices
Source: Pharmabiz
|
EPS (Rs) |
| Company Name |
FY10 |
FY11 |
FY12 |
| Narmada
Gelatines |
20.3 |
23.5 |
27.4 |
| Nitta
Gelatines |
17.8 |
2.25 |
6 |
| India Gelatine |
6.6 |
3.1 |
7.6 |
|
