Macau TCM grant quotas exhausted after three firms secure MOP3 million each

Three pharmaceutical companies have each received MOP3 million in one-off GMP certification subsidies under Macau’s incentive scheme, fully exhausting the available quotas as the government accelerates efforts to develop the city’s traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) sector.

The grants fall under the Incentive Scheme for Upgrading and Development of the Pharmaceutical Industry in Macau, administered by the Economic and Technological Development Bureau (DSEDT). Director Yau Yun Wah confirmed that all three subsidy quotas have now been allocated.

A separate component of the scheme, which supports the local registration of proprietary Chinese medicines, offers MOP100,000 per approved product. Of 50 available quotas, five applications have been approved so far, while two are still under review.

The updates were provided in response to legislative inquiries from lawmaker Si Ka Lon, who raised concerns about industrial policy direction, digital transformation, funding support for overseas clinical trials and investment attraction strategies.

Beyond subsidy measures, authorities said work is underway on a larger biomedical infrastructure project. Lo Chi Fai, head of the Office of the Secretary for Economy and Finance, said the government is advancing plans for a dedicated technology R&D industrial park focused on biomedicine.

The planned park will include innovation platforms, customized manufacturing facilities and supporting services, as well as data and computing centers designed to shorten research and development cycles through digital technologies.

Separately, the State Key Laboratory of Quality Research in Chinese Medicine at the Macau University of Science and Technology was reorganized last August, strengthening its research capacity.

In November, the “Guangdong-Macao Joint Laboratory for Innovative Drug Research on Traditional Chinese Medicine and Natural-Derived Small Nucleic Acids” was established, becoming the first joint laboratory led by a Macau tertiary institution.

To address funding and operational challenges faced by small and medium-sized enterprises conducting overseas clinical trials, the Science and Technology Development Fund has adopted a “funding plus support services” model. The approach encourages collaboration between local institutions and international research partners to strengthen clinical research capacity. RD