By Richard OTIM
Stretched on the 18 acre expanse of land, a magnificent multi-billion complex at Kajjansi awaits to be commissioned, the new home for National Medical Stores.
With a combined financing from government, the new state of art warehouse secured with support from partners including the Global Fund, GAVI, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and UNICEF is expected to house all the main departments that form NMS.
It takes one over 2 hours to tour around the complex which has some of the most modern office facilities. This part of the efforts to make NMS a center of excellence in medical logistics and modern one-stop center for procurement, storage and distribution of medicines and medical supplies for mostly government health facilities across the country.
The General Manager NMS, Mr. Moses Kamabare adds that the NMS story, epitomized in the Kajjansi complex is founded on the notion of self-belief, the spirit upon which much of NMS innovations are grounded. “The notion of self-belief is what motivates us at NMS. Previously, it was a general perception that no government agency can be efficient or effective,” Mr. Kamabare said, adding that the successful acquisition of the new warehouse is clear proof that it is possible with other government agencies too.
Once completed, the new warehouse will have the capacity to contain thousands of millions of tones in a single storage, making the facility the most efficient and envied in the region. NMS wanted more space because the volume of products it handles has tremendously increased.
By 2008, the value of products handled by NMS was worth UGX 60 billion, but last financial year they were worth UGX 1.3 trillion. Consequently, the warehouse at Entebbe is not enough.
The new state-of-the-art warehouse at Kajjansi will increase the capacity to 30,000 pallet positions compared to the current 8,000 pallet positions. The new warehouse will also be environmentally friendly with 50% of all its power requirements being produced by solar.
Medical testing will also be housed at the medical testing laboratory.
“The only problem we’ve had in the past is that we pull others down instead of working together to build better institutions. We have made this possible at NMS, we work as a team and no one should ever be the weakest point,” adds the General Manager. Centre of excellence for medical logistics
Additionally, the new NMS home will be able to accommodate a complete fleet of NMS trucks, other delivery vans and all official and private vehicles for the staff – making the agency a center of excellence for medical logistics in the region.
“The biggest room we’ve got at NMS is for continuous improvement. We have the potential to get even better than what we are now and that is our goal,” Mr. Kamabare stresses.
It is hoped, too, the facility will go a long way in alleviating most of the limitations that previously had crippled the supply chain including adequate storage space.
Established as a Statutory Corporation by an Act of Parliament in 1993 under Chapter 207 of the Laws of Uganda with a mission to effectively and efficiently supply essential medicines and medical supplies to health facilities in Uganda, National Medical Stores has since made great strides towards becoming the best in medical logistics across East and Central Africa.
