Adire Business Receives Boost as NEPC Facilitates Export Competitivenes goods Training In Ogun
Raymond Osho, Abeokuta
Nigeria Export Promotion Council (NEPC) has facilitated training of Adire makers, designers and distributors as part of its mandate to promote non-oil export in the nation.
The Council said this would encourage export of value-added Adire products to the global markets.
Adire, translates as tie and dye is the name given to indigo dyed cloth produced by Yoruba of South Western Nigeria.
The NEPC’s Abeokuta Export Assistance Office Deputy Director, Samson Idowu at the capacity building on promoting Adire value-chain for export competitiveness in Abeokuta, the Ogun state capital on Thursday, said the council’s target was to ensure the enhancement of participants’ skills in the Adire business for the betterment of the economy.
The over 400 participants were trained on easy and modern way of adire production, labelling, packaging as well as marketing of adire products so as so meet the challenge of international competitors.
His words “Our major mandate is to promote nonoil export and we know that Adire is one of the heritage product that people are knowledgeable and competent in promoting and we see a lot of potentials in this that’s why we gathered adire makers, designers, distributors to learn new trade on how to enhance their skills in Adire so that at the end of the day they can earn more money and improve the local economy so that the trade of adire as second hand clothe will be a thing of the past.
Idowu continued “I can assure you that this is just the beginning. For us in NEPC, we don’t believe in politicising development or politicising issues. We are driven by performance/result and that’s why we have decided to go to the Adire people to know their problems and their challenges before the roll out of interventions.
“Now we have known their challenges, this is the beginning of overcoming th challenges. We have availed them generalised information on how to engage marketing, how to enhance processing and export,” he added.
The Iyalode of Yorubaland, Mrs Alaba Lawson who spoke to Journalists at the event appealed to the Federal Government to tap into the enormous opportunities abound in the Adire industry for economic growth.
According to Iyalode, investing in the Adire industry would reduce degradation of local Adire products in international community.
“I think we need to stick in to buying our home made Nigerian goods , and I think it’s still falls back on the government , what are they doing when foreign Adire products are coming in, not only that the infrastructure too must be produced by the government because this is what is making Adire products to be expensive.
