Our Work

Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients (APIs) are the actual drugs that are then formulated into tablets, liquids, capsules or injections. Access to quality, affordable APIs is thus critical to functioning health systems anywhere. Yet despite their centrality in the pharmaceutical value chain, the manufacturing of APIs is largely concentrated in two markets: India and China. The usual argument justifying this dynamic is that labour and other cost advantages place manufactures in China and India in a position that manufactures elsewhere cannot compete with.  While this argument might hold true for developed countries in Europe and North America, it may not hold for sub-Sahara Africa. Thus, there is both a compelling commercial and a strong policy case to develop API manufacturing capacity on the continent.

The policy case, in particular, has been well developed: that the dependence of local pharmaceutical manufacturers on two main supply nodes causes significant challenges and may threaten the supply of critical ingredients, particularly for manufacturers and markets in sub-Sahara Africa that tend to be the first ones to be impacted when global supply tightens.

Despite the desire by policymakers to diversify API supply chains and an appetite by manufacturers in sub-Saharan Africa to explore expansion into the API market, no meaningful progress in establishing manufacturing capacity on the continent (outside of South Africa) has been made. Manufacturers are disincentivized by the cost of capital, lack of technology and end-market access. Potential capital providers have always questioned whether there was sufficient expertise and capacity in the market to support production. APIFA, as a non-profit manages to break this deadlock by providing a non-commercial platform that provides access to resources and visibility to manufacturers while assuring capital providers of their investments.