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FG Urged to Ban Importation of Fake FabricsFG Urged to Ban Importation of Fake Fabrics
Daily Champion
Ufomba Uzuegbu
26 June 2007
Ace textile printer, Mr. Ben Henry Chukwunyere has appealed to the Federal government to check the influx of substandard fabrics into the country to protect the local industry.
He also appealed to government to ensure that the N50bn and N80bn respectively earmarked by the former administration of Chief Olusegun Obasanjo to revive the nation's textile industry are disbursed to relevant organizations and major stakeholders in the industry.
Chukwunyere, the managing director of Lagos-based Chen Print and Textiles, stated these in an exclusive interview with Daily Champion at the weekend, stressing that massive importation of low quality fabrics from Asia was impacting negatively on local industry operators. According to him, the unwholesome development was depleting the nation's foreign reserves while enriching the economies of other nations at "our own detriment".
Chukwuneye said "the fabrics from Asian countries hardly stand the test of time because they are not done on pure cotton. The dye they use more often than not, is not good and if such fabrics are spread under the sum, they do not last. "Most Nigerians still go for them because of mass poverty in the country. Ours is handmade. We use good quality cotton so that they can stand the test of time".
He pleaded with President Umaru Musa Yar'Adua to sustain Obasanjo's reform policy for the textile industry which he described as a mass employer of labour.
The Obasanjo administration had set up a committee headed by former finance minister, Mrs. Nenadi Usman to source for N50bn and N80bn respectively and disburse them to revitalize and rehabilitate the industry through the provision of soft loans with single digit interest rate to textile manufacturers and textile mills in the country.
Chukwunyene said this policy if implemented to the letter, will help in reviving and rehabilitating the industry which has been in comatose for a long time".
Copyright © 2007 Daily Champion
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