One hundred leaders from the African continent and outside the region, including from the United States and Europe, gathered today in Addis for a two-day conference focused on addressing key challenges for innovation and technology transfer to build a stronger pharmaceutical sector in Africa.
Topics range from regional supply security to technology gaps in private sector development and public sector research and development (R&D) as well as striking the right balance between intellectual property rights and access during and after pandemics. Panellists will also review new financing models to spur investment in the sector.
The Chief Executive Officer of the new launched African Pharmaceutical Technology Foundation (APTF) Professor Padmashree Gehl Sampath said, "the conference is the first of its kind in Africa to examine the barriers to the domestic manufacture and production of critical health products for the continent."
Articulating the vision of the foundation, Professor Gehl Sampath said the agency wants "a vibrant African pharmaceutical industry that can manufacture and innovate pharmaceutical products in Africa for the African people."
She said the foundation will aspire "to move from 400 companies to at least 800 pharmaceutical companies in the region by 2040."
Keynote speeches from Mekdas Daba Feyssa, Ethiopian Minister of Health; Monique Nsanzabaganwe, Chairperson of the African Union Commission; Ahmed Ogwell Ouma, Deputy Director-General, Africa CDC; Edward Kwakwa; Assistant Director-General, the World Intellectual Property Organization; Michel Sidibé, African Union's Special Envoy to the African Medicines Agency, and Oyebanji Oyelaran-Oyeyinka, Senior Special Advisor to the President of the African Development Bank, frame the seven-session debate today and tomorrow.
Today's program began with video recorded welcoming remarks from Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO), Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala Director-General, World Trade Organization (WTO) and Dr. Akinwumi Adesina, President of the African Development Bank (AfDB) Group, stressing their support for the discussions.
"Access to health products is an essential component of Universal Health Coverage and health security," said Tedros. "Thank you for your commitment to a stronger pharmaceutical sector on the continent."
"Multiple stars in the global landscape are aligning for the continent to attract domestic and international investment to build value chains and a solid manufacturing base in this sector," said WTO's Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala. She added: "Companies should try to get ahead of the curve...build partnerships and work on voluntary licences...[which] come with real technology transfer. The APTF has a strong role to play in all of this."
Africa imports over 70% of all the medicines it needs, at a cost of nearly $14 billion annually. The continent conducts only 2% of world research on new infections, despite shouldering a quarter of the global disease burden. To reverse the trend, Africa will have to, among other necessary steps, overcome barriers to technology access in both public and private sectors across the continent.
Organizations represented at the conference include the Science for Africa Foundation, the Medicines Patent Pool, Ghana's National Vaccine Institute, the African Vaccine Manufacturing Initiative, Partnerships for African Vaccine Manufacturing, Drugs for Neglected Diseases initiative, the African Center of Excellence for Genomics of Infectious Disease, Uganda Virus Research Institute, the Regionalized Vaccine Manufacturing Collaborative, the African Continental Free Trade Area, Unitaid and the International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers and Associations.
Also attending are senior executives from African pharmaceutical, biotech and vaccine companies as well as academics from world-renowned universities.
"Africa needs to change the technological environment...and build a pharmaceutical and biomedical research and development ecosystem that can support world class local pharmaceutical industries," said Adesina.
"We were convinced this could not happen without a dedicated institution that works to promote change and facilitate technology access. That is why the African Development Bank created the APTF with support from the African Union," he explained.
Established in 2022, as an independent regional agency, the APTF works to improve Africa's access to the technologies needed to discover, develop and manufacture medicines, vaccines and diagnostics.
The foundation supports African companies to engage in technology transactions, commercialize intellectual property and diversity product portfolios, research institutions to become centers of excellence and governments to shape healthy product markets, among other initiatives.
Recently Devex, a media platform for the global development community, named the foundation among 24 agencies around the world to watch out for in 2024.
"The APTF will be a game changer," said Oyebanji Oyelaran-Oyeyinka, Senior Special Advisor to the president of the African Development Bank. "Its focus is to change the way global companies will relate and enter into partnerships with African companies. The foundation will ease entry into the region and remove structural, regulatory and institutional barriers in ways that fast-track collaborative domestic production ventures."
The International Conference on Innovation, Intellectual Property and Technology Transfer in Africa's Pharmaceutical Sector is supported by the German Ministry for Development Cooperation and Development. The full program and list of speakers is available here.
