"A degree will not be of much help in a competitive job market"

Dr SC Jain, senior vice president, International Panaacea, Delhi

Biotechnology is a sunrise industry and a growth engine of future, opening numerous career opportunities in different sectors, i.e. agriculture and food, healthcare and environment. Hitherto, career opportunities were mostly found in research and development arena, providing jobs in academic and research institutes but now there is ample scope of jobs in the biotech industry, which is developing at a very fast pace in all the above mentioned three sectors. In addition, several promising applications of new sciences are available in the industries related to pharmaceutical, biomedical, agricultural and bioinformatics. Further, for start-up companies, incubation opportunities are available for graduates in biotechnology.

The Indian biotechnology market was a whopping Rs 4,745 crore in 2005 and career opportunities in the biotechnology industry are therefore, enormous and on the rise with the growth rate of almost 37 percent. The IT boom has successfully confirmed the hypothesis that higher the quality of learning, higher will be the earnings.

Rich yields

Biotechnology has prominently emerged as a major segment of life sciences industry. A biotech student has wide scope and option to specialize in any one segment of life and further make it a rewarding profession.

There has been a paradigm shift from conventional agriculture, totally dependent on vagaries of weather and being a traditional occupation for livelihood to a scientific and knowledge-based industry. This change calls for the implementation of modern biotechnology at a level where the farmer in the rural background can benefit in terms of increased crop yield and better economic returns on sustainable basis. India will not be able to realize its strengths if the rural populace is left behind. Agriculture, therefore, has to be treated as an industry and the biotech graduates have a bright career in this industry.

Distinct career-making industries

Agri-biotechnology:

• Bio-agri-inputs such as biofertilisers, biopesticides, vermi culture and organic manures.

• Organic farming-cultivation, processing and marketing of organic produce.

• Maintenance of biomass and micro nutrients level in soil for sustainable productivity.

• Large-scale cultivation of jatropha and its processing for biofuel production.

• Biotech parks and Bio IT parks, their operation and maintenance.

• Bioinformatics

• Contract farming of medicinal and aromatic plants

Applications of nanotechnology

Agriculture and food processing, safe drinking water, drug delivery system, structural ceramics, energy conservation, high temperature nano thermometer, carbon nano tube sheets, pigments and coatings, medicine and environmental aspects.

Tissue engineering

The tissue engineering industry is an emerging market involving research and development taking place in the world's leading universities and companies worldwide. Tissue engineering is a multidisciplinary field that is part of both the medical device industry and the biotechnology/biopharmaceutical industry.

Clinical research

In the clinical research sector, it has been estimated that by the year 2010, more than 50,000 professionals will be required in India alone. With India becoming a signatory to TRIPS and clinical trials being mandatory as per ICH–GCP norms, new career opportunities are abundantly available in clinical research which covers positions such as clinical research scientists, clinical research coordinator, clinical research investigator, clinical research managers, business development managers etc.

IPRs for a biotechnologist

In today's era, a degree will not be of much help in a competitive job market. We need to train people for specific jobs. In biotechnology, the generalist biotech graduates will not serve the purpose for the industry unless they are intensively trained in specific areas to fit in specific jobs. With the National Knowledge Commission in place, the future of the Indian industry depends upon the knowledge-based-industry and biotechnology is the most knowledge-based-industry. The scope of this industry is immense and the personnel trained in biotechnology shall ever remain sought after.

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