Govt extends deadline for pharma barcode adoption

Temporary relief to the pharma exporters!

The Ministry of Commerce has extended the deadline to fix bar codes on primary level packaging by pharma companies to July 1, 2014. Exporters were to implement bar codes on primary level packaging with effect from July 1, 2013 which has now been deferred.

"Earlier, the requirement of affixing barcodes on primary level packaging was to take effect from July 1, 2013. Now this date has been deferred to July 1, 2014," the Directorate-General of Foreign Trade (DGFT) said in a public notice.

A barcode helps in tracking and tracing of origin of drugs, which in turn helps in minimising the chances of genuine drugs being considered spurious, sub-standard or counterfeit. Primary level packaging is the first-level product packaging such as the bottle, can, jar, tube, that contains the item sold.