Storage of Ayurvedic, Sidha and Unani Products under Goods Manufacturing Practice:

Three type of material required to be stored in an Ayurvedic manufacturing unit.

• Raw Material
• Packaging Material
• Finished Goods

Stores: Store should have adequate space for independently and separately store raw material, packaging material and finished products. Each manufacturing unit require to set-up stores for these materials. 

Raw Material:

All raw materials i.e. herbs, excipients, sugar etc. would be stored in Raw material Store. The manufacture based on the experience and the characteristics of the particular raw material used in Ayurveda, Siddha and Unani system shall decide the use of appropriate containers which would protect the quality of raw materials as well as prevent it from damage due to dampness, microbiological contamination or rodent and insect infestation etc. If any raw material require special environmental conditions, then raw material store may divide into sub sections to provide suitable condition to these raw materials with proper equipment and fittings. Raw material should be stored carefully and category wise to prevent any mixing or contamination. Care may be taken to handle the following different categories of raw materials:-

• Raw material of metallic origin.
• Raw material of mineral origin.
• Raw material from animal source.
• Fresh herbs.
• Dry herbs or plant parts
• Excipients etc.
• Volatile oils/perfumes and flavours
• Plant concentrates/ extracts and exudates/resins etc.

Each container used for raw material storage shall be properly identified with the label which indicates name of the raw material, source of supply and will also clearly state the status of raw material such as ‘UNDER TEST‘ or ‘APPROVED‘ or ‘REJECTED‘. The labels shall further indicate the identity of the particular supply in the form of Batch No. or Lot No. and the date of receipt of the consignment.

All the raw materials shall be sampled and got tested either by the in-house Ayurvedic, Siddha and Unani experts (Quality control technical person) or by the laboratories approved by the Government and shall be used only on approval after verifying. The rejected raw material should be removed from other raw material store and should be kept in separate room. First Come, First Out Procedure should be followed when raw materials is required for manufacturing process. Records of the receipt, testing and approval or rejection and use of raw material should be maintained. 

Packaging Materials:

All packaging materials such as bottles, jars, capsules etc. shall be stored properly. All containers and closure shall be adequately cleaned and dried before packing the products. 

Finished Goods Stores:

Finished goods store should have two area. One is Quarantine and second is Approved Finished Goods Stock. In Quarantine area, all finished goods should be transfer after proper packaging for quality checking purpose. After checked by quality control laboratory and experts with reference to its packing/lable for correctness of finished goods, Finished goods will be moved to Approved Finished Good Stock Area.

Only approved finished goods should be dispatched from manufacturing site and proper distribution record should be maintained. If any product require special storage condition, finished goods store should provide necessary environmental conditions.