Policy for health industry development

The Government shall strengthen Norwegian competitiveness through good overall framework conditions. We need a more diversified economy going forwards to safeguard our welfare society through more profitable jobs and increased value creation. As a knowledge-intensive and growing industry, a well-equipped and efficient health industry will contribute to the development of sustainable services for the population.

The health industry has many of the same needs as the rest of business sector. Good general framework conditions for the business sector means good framework conditions for the health industry. The sum of the framework conditions is decisive for establishing a value-creating and adaptable business sector. The Norwegian business sector enjoys good terms overall, with an effective tax system, sound infrastructure and political stability. However, our relatively open economy requires us to adapt and readjust.

Municipalities and health trusts are an important market for the health industry and are often referred to as the ‘domestic market’. The health industry meets the authorities as regulator, research funder, owner of universities and hospitals, manager of health registries and biobanks. Often, the public sector is the only customer. For many companies, the domestic market is also an important testing ground for new products and solutions.

Many areas of the health industry are characterised by long research and development cycles that need advanced infrastructure and production capacities. These are strictly regulated and require access to patients and data from public health and care services. This means that there is a lot of cooperation in the research and development process, across sectors and national borders. Commercialisation processes are long, expensive and risky, and require long-term and risk-bearing capital with knowledge of the health and care sector and the health industry. In addition, the value chains are long and complicated, requiring a large number of input factors that are often produced by one global manufacturer alone.

The value and supply chains have faced challenges that have increased over time, especially during the pandemic, and currently as a result of the geopolitical situation. Some challenges have arisen through market mechanisms and historical structures, others have been created through business and security policies in certain states.

A robust health industry is part of the foundation for society’s resilience in crisis. A good industrial and business policy, which prioritises sustainability, restructuring, efficiency and profitability, can also have positive ripple effects for preparedness. It is about using society’s overall resources efficiently.

To ensure access to pharmaceuticals and medical devices, we need to cooperate with our closest partners in the Nordic region and the rest of Europe. The EU is investing in the health industry to build resilience through both regulatory and non-regulatory measures. The Norwegian health industry must participate in this European initiative.

It is important to the Government that the business sector has a significant role in the interaction required to solve the challenges in the health and care sector, and it will work to facilitate good interaction between the health and care services and various private stakeholders in the health innovation ecosystem.

In 2022, the Government presented a Roadmap for the Green Industrial Initiative. It includes several key focus areas for the entire breadth of the business community, such as access to capital, research, technology development, digitalisation, expertise and export. The health industry is a green, low-emission industry, and the Government therefore believes it should have the best growth and development opportunities. The Government aims to present an updated Roadmap for the Green Industrial Initiative in the autumn of 2023.

We have received input from industry stakeholders, the public administration and research communities in areas which they consider particularly important for the development of the health industry in Norway. We have divided this under twelve topics in this roadmap, where we describe what the Government is doing and outline how it will handle these topics in the time ahead. Within the twelve topics, policies that fall under the remit of several ministries are discussed. The responsible ministry(-ies) is shown in brackets in ‘the road ahead’ sections.