India's medical technology industry is expected to touch exports of up to USD 20 billion by 2030, but the sector needs more government incentives and further ease of doing business to accelerate overseas shipments, industry body CII said on Friday.
The production-linked incentive (PLI) scheme for the medical technology sector currently available for select medical devices needs to be extended across products, while export incentives to 'reimburse hidden costs' need to be provided to manufacturers, CII Chairman National Medical Technology Forum Himanshu Baid told.
"Today, we are importing almost 60 to 70 per cent of our medical equipment which are needed in the country. Whereas, our manufacturing is still very low as around 30 per cent is only manufactured in the country. Our imports are far exceeding our exports. Our imports are almost USD 8 billion and our exports are close to USD 4 billion," he said.
However, Baid said, India has the best potential to grow this industry to the next level, taking advantage of the world adopting the 'China plus one' strategy to reduce import dependence on one particular country.
India is very well poised to take advantage of it on the back of the talent it has in terms of software, hardware and low-cost labor as compared to China.
