Advantage India

Uday Chatterjee
07 December 2003

Mumbai: After having showcased its prowess in the information technology and business process outsourcing sectors, the need of the hour for the Indian industry is to step up the ante in the biotechnology sector. Why? Given India's natural resources and talented manpower there are opportunities galore in biotech.

Biotechnology is any technique that uses living organisms on substances derived from these organisms to make or modify a product thereby improving plants, animals or microorganisms for specific use. Simply put, biotechnology is about converting apples to oranges.

India has the second largest population in the world and that automatically makes it the second largest market for biotech products and services. A geographical study of the Indian subcontinent has revealed that India has the most varied species of flora and fauna.

In percentage terms, India has roughly 6.0 per cent of the total flowering plants that are present in the world, about 7.6 per cent of the total mammal species, 12.6 per cent of bird species, and 11.7 per cent of fishes. In effect, India's immense biodiversity offers ideal conditions for biotech companies to set up shop here as they can find samples with ease and conduct field research more efficiently.

In addition, India has one of the largest agricultural sectors in the world and has varied climatic zones that can help in research and development of different agri-biotech products.