Demographics of Pakistan:
The population of Pakistan is 16.98 Million as per latest
consensus held in 2010. With the high value of 2.69 growth rate, making is
sixth most populous country in the world .The entire population presents the
flavour of being multi ethnic and multi cultural and unevenly distributed in
four provinces namely Punjab, Sind, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, and Baluchistan.
The major part of population lives in former three provinces where as
estimation 79% 1of the entire population is living . and more than
half of the population of the country have less or minimal access to the modern
medicines and healthcare products.
Pharmaceutical Industry in Pakistan:
A remarkable growth is seen in the pharmaceutical industry
in the country particularly in the last few decades making it the tenth largest
market in Asia Pacific. More than 600 enterprises and companies are active in
the industry giving employment opportunities to more than 100,000 workers.
There are more than 400 manufacturing units .which includes the units from
multinational companies due to economic advantages. Since the last two decades
an enormous change is observed in the pharmaceutical industry of Pakistan, the
number of local pharmaceutical companies has increased dramatically changing
the ratio of local pharmaceutical to MNCs in the industry to 55% to 45%
respectively.
Despite the lower annual per-capita spending on medicine
which is US$10, far below the Asia Pacific regional average of US$142 (Pakistan
Pharmaceutical Sector 2008), the growth in the sales of pharmaceutical products
is significant with increase of about 65% in last five years, from USD 1.4Billion
in 2007 to USD 2.3 Billion in 2012. The local industry meets about 70 per cent
of the total demand of finished medicine in the country
Health care spending:
Increasing urbanisation and healthcare awareness with rising life
expectancy and growth in elderly population is resulting in the greater demand
for healthcare services and products. As per report of “Economist intelligence
unit”2 the overall healthcare spending is expected to rise from an
estimated US$4.2bn in 2010 to US$6.3bn in 2015, depicting the annual rise of average
8.4% 3
.Respiratory diseases in Pakistan:
As a
result of increasing urbanisation and its consequences in various forms, with more
or less 300 million people and the expected increase to 400 million by 2025, Asthma
is turning out to be growing burden on society in terms of quality of life, morbidity
and healthcare costs4 . According to the ISAG study
Clinical asthma in Pakistani population is 2.5-5% with adult prevalence of
about 5-10 % and dangerously high prevalence of 19% in children.
Fig.1 World map for prevalence of clinical asthma
Marketing strategies in Pakistan.
Traditional marketing techniques in pharmaceutical industry:
Nearly all pharmaceutical companies pursue the old and
traditional marketing tactics for promoting and launching any new product or
medicine into the target market , these
revolves around following actions:
I.
Direct marketing to the physicians and doctors
using the pharmaceutical representatives (medical representative) which
eventually contributes to the sales cost which is normally 20-25% of annual
product revenue.
II.
giving free samples of products and drugs to the
doctors and pharmacist
III.
publishing the details of product in various
medical journal articles and other opinion leaders
IV.
Publicity gifts like prescription writing pads,
stationery etc that highlights the company logo and major products description.
V.
And last but not the least , sponsoring the
medical education.
Sprouting and suggested marketing techniques:
With the shifting routine of individual, in our case doctors
and medical practitioners ,increasing inclination toward digital media that
includes internet, use of gadgets for getting latest information and news is
observed resulting in their less time and attention for the medical
representatives and their product promotions. Its a high time for the newer
companies to build their marketing strategies around digital marketing that
includes interactive websites, social media (like twitter, facebook, linkedin),
blogs, discussion forums, chatrooms, applications for gadgets etc to interact
with the target audience on regular basis without losing their interest
and company’s competitiveness.
References:
1-population (Pakistan
Demographic Survey,2003)
2.http://www.eiu.com/index.asp?layout=ib3Article&article_id=1088067693&pubtypeid=1152462500&country_id=1140000314&page_title=&rf=0
3 - Review of Pakistan
Pharmaceutical Industry: SWOT Analysis by Mohammad Aamir1 and Khalid Zaman
4- Incorrect
Inhaler Technique Compromising Quality of Life of
Asthmatic Patients
ANJUM HASHMI,1 JAMIL AHMED
SOOMRO,2 AFZAL MEMON,3 TAHIRA KAUSAR SOOMRO4ww
5- THE DRUGS ACT, 1976 (XXXI OF 1976)
[11th May, 1976] An Act to regulate the import, export, manufacture, storage,
distribution and sale of drugs
