Russian drugs displace imports from the market

Import substitution remains a relevant issue in the pharmaceutical market for several years. The first shifts in import substitution and expansion of innovative pharmaceutical production facilities occurred under Pharma – 2020, a state program which started as early as in 2011.

About 3.0 billion packages of medicinal products worth 281.7 billion rubles were sold in 2017. In the commercial pharmacy market, the share of imported medicines is shrinking, while the Russian-made drugs take an increasingly larger part. In 2017, the share of Russian-made drugs rose by 0.4% in value terms compared to 2016.

However, in ruble-denominated terms, the market is dominated by imported products, as their retail price is more than 3 times higher than the price of Russian-made medicines (for 2017, 319 rubles or +3.4% vs. 94 rubles or +3.7% compared to 2016).

According to the monthly audit by DSM Group, in the first two months of 2018, the share of Russian-made drugs was 30.9% in ruble-denominated terms and 59.6% in terms of packages.

In physical terms, the market is dominated by Russian-made medicines (in 2017, their share increased by 0.5% to reach 59.2%).