diff --git a/requirements.txt b/requirements.txt
deleted file mode 100644
index 9664ac2..0000000
--- a/requirements.txt
+++ /dev/null
@@ -1,4 +0,0 @@
-numpy==1.15.4
-matplotlib=3.3.1
-six=1.15.0
-scipy=1.5.1
diff --git a/requirements/requirements.txt b/requirements/requirements.txt
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..f94762e
--- /dev/null
+++ b/requirements/requirements.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,5 @@
+# file contains the list of required libraries for pip  build
+numpy
+matplotlib
+six
+scipy
diff --git a/setup.py b/setup.py
index 989fd7a..8d1af97 100644
--- a/setup.py
+++ b/setup.py
@@ -1,11 +1,32 @@
 import setuptools
+import os
 from distutils.core import setup
 
 
+PACKAGE_DIR = os.path.abspath(os.path.dirname(__file__))
 
 with open("README.md", "r") as fh:
     long_description = fh.read()
 
+def pip_requirements(*args):
+    requirements = []
+    for name in args:
+        fname = os.path.join(
+            PACKAGE_DIR, "requirements", "{}.txt".format(name)
+        )
+        if not os.path.exists(fname):
+            emsg = (
+                f"Unable to find the {name!r} requirements file at {fname!r}."
+            )
+            raise RuntimeError(emsg)
+        with open(fname, "r") as fh:
+            for line in fh:
+                line = line.strip()
+                if not line or line.startswith("#"):
+                    continue
+                requirements.append(line)
+    return requirements
+
 
 setup(name='mo-catnip',
       version='0.0.2',
@@ -19,11 +40,7 @@
       packages=setuptools.find_packages(where='lib'),
       package_dir={"": "lib"},
       python_requires='>=3.6',
-      install_requires=['numpy',
-                        'matplotlib',
-                        'six',
-                        'scipy'
-                        ],
+      install_requires=pip_requirements("requirements"),
       keywords = ["cmip", "climate", "analysis", "rcp"],
       classifiers=[
         "Programming Language :: Python :: 3",
diff --git a/test.py b/test.py
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..b7ab3f9
--- /dev/null
+++ b/test.py
@@ -0,0 +1,32 @@
+import os
+
+
+
+PACKAGE_DIR = os.path.abspath(os.path.dirname(__file__))
+
+
+
+
+
+def pip_requirements(*args):
+    requirements = []
+    for name in args:
+        fname = os.path.join(
+            PACKAGE_DIR, "requirements", "{}.txt".format(name)
+        )
+        if not os.path.exists(fname):
+            emsg = (
+                f"Unable to find the {name!r} requirements file at {fname!r}."
+            )
+            raise RuntimeError(emsg)
+        with open(fname, "r") as fh:
+            for line in fh:
+                line = line.strip()
+                if not line or line.startswith("#"):
+                    continue
+                requirements.append(line)
+    return requirements
+
+
+req = pip_requirements("requirements")
+print(req)