Tanzania local manufacturing

By 2009, Tanzania-based production was supplying an estimated 35% of a local medicines market worth about US 140 million, and rising medicines exports had reached almost US 8 million. A particular strength of the local firms was supply to the rural areas rural availability relied quite heavily on local manufacturers, and interviews with rural medicines buyers in 2006-07 had found evidence of brand recognition and trust for locally produced medicines, especially those from Shelys (Chaudhuri et al., 2010 Mujinja et al., 2014). In 2009, Tanzanian pharmaceutical production looked like a relative success story. 

Our supply chain data (Table 8.1) show that the public sector wholesaler in each country had bought a higher proportion of the tracer essential medicines from local manufacturers than had the private wholesalers. The faith-based wholesaler in Kenya (MEDS) was the most likely of all to source these medicines locally. All Kenyan wholesale sectors, furthermore, were more likely than their Tanzanian counterparts to buy these essential medicines from their local manufacturers (Table 8.1). Finally, while Tanzania buyers sourced medicines from Kenya ( other African for Tanzania in Table 8.1 is largely Kenyan), the Kenyan buyers bought little from non-Kenyan African suppliers. 

The main criticisms of locally manufactured medicines raised by private sector respondents in both countries concerned packaging, which was said to compare poorly with imported competing items, putting off users. In Tanzania, there was repeated criticism that some locally manufactured tablets tended to disintegrate too easily, and some unfavourable comparisons with the quality of Kenyan manufactured tablets. 

The decisions of private wholesalers were therefore important to the local manufacturers domestic market demand. Kenyan manufactured medicines were quite widely imported into Tanzania by the private wholesalers (Table 8.1 see also Chapter 2), while there were few Tanzanian items found in the Kenyan market. The Tanzanian private market was more heavily reliant on India (Table 8.1). 

The Tanzania Food and Drug Authority (TFDA) presses for GMP adherence. Tanzanian firms either have attained locally acceptable GMP standards or are working towards them with TFDA support. Manufacturers agreed that TFDA required standards rise over time, just as do the standards achieved by international competitors and the expectations of international buyers. None, when interviewed, had WHO prequalification of individual products to allow them to tender for donor-funded contracts. 

Tanzania, which investigated supply chains from local producers and importers into the health sector. Qualitative interviews and quantitative data collection on availability, somce and price of a checklist of tracer medicines and other essential supplies were conducted in hoth countries. In Tanzania, 42 health facilities (public, faith-based and private), pharmacies and drug shops across four very diverse districts were visited (Tibandebage et al., 2014), while in Kenya, 55 health facilities, pharmacies and shops were interviewed in a comparative study (Kariuki et al., 2015). Following these supply chain studies, wholesalers, manufacturers and poUcy and regulatory stakeholders were interviewed in both countries in 2013-14. This chapter draws also on some of these interviews, alongside secondary data somces. 

An important difference between the two countries is in the scale of the local pharmaceutical industry and the range of products the firms have the capability to supply (Chapters 2 and 3). While Tanzania had just five operating firms when the 2013 research was done, Kenya had about 40 producers, including firms capable of supplying parenterals manufactured in sterile conditions. The density in itself meant that Kenyan firms were more able than Tanzanian firms to supply their local market. However, they still currently (2013) supply only around 25% of the domestic demand (Chapter 2). There is clearly room for expansion of local supply in both countries. 

The sharp process of institutional change in the health systems and medicines financing in Kenya and Tanzania has faced the largely locally owned manufacturers of medicines currently working in the two countries with... 

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