I am based out of India. Irrespective of the location, being in this domain for 2+ years now, I can tell you that while there may be comparatively few open positions, the pay (irrespective of location again) is above par if compared to enterprise but on par otherwise, for experienced programmer!
If you are at entry level, I can think of having a related self project or contributing to any of the numerous open source projects in the scientific stack will do the trick. Hope this helps.