Milieu: Albeit conventional textiles manufacturing is some hundreds of years old diligence, engaged in by Nigerians focusing on the textiles production of a wider range, hardly some five decades ago when the industrial productions were initiated. Anyway, the industry got further thrust during the year 1956 when Kaduna Textile Mills was founded which was later followed by United Nigeria Textiles during the year 1962. Several other mills like Enpee, Aswani and Asaba were also founded subsequently. However, the condition of textiles industry is extremely poor almost for the past decade which has resulted in closure of Kaduna and Enpee Mills along with some 70 other textiles mills.

Due to the bulk imports of textiles at quite lower rates than domestic production costing, numerous mills faced insolvency followed by the mass retrenchments of its workers. However, this condition was further exaggerated by illegitimate imports across the borders from Cotonou. Thus the Nigerian Textiles industry is consequently in the difficult condition probably facing extended losses on the monetary and employment perceptions.

Major activities: Textiles Industry chiefly includes production of cotton and synthetic fabrics. The manufacturing of fabrics have observed the hike over the years in the conventionally cotton oriented industry because of changing styles. Over the years Nigeria is growing cotton in the country catering textile mills. Nonetheless, better quality cotton is also imported along with synthetic fabrics. Also there are yarn manufacturing factories that use imported raw-materials in their domestic units. These units also include the major distinctive activities of spinning for yarn production, cloth weaving production, cloth dyeing, printing and finishing. Also activities like lace and embroideries are other additional significance. Furthermore, several bigger mills swathe all the sub-sectors, while some smaller mills cover single or multiple activities also survive by feeding the bigger mills towards vertical incorporating activities.

Industry Information: Albeit accurate statistics are unavailable, there are almost 60 units of textiles industry which incorporates units that are inoperative or working at lower capability operational markings. On an average, the capability utilization during the year 2005 is anticipated to be merely somewhere around 25% of the established capability of around 1.5bn meters per year. Despite of the restrictions on the fabric imports enforced during the year 2004, the imports still persists and is overflowing the markets, because of lower costs and rising inclinations amongst the customers to use imported fabrics. Quite a few mills required to make important decisions on refurbish and retooling bit are normally disheartened given the feasibility and failure to beat traders who import thrashing bans. The mills intend selling their finished products either through their own retail set-ups or through mediators/dealers authorized by them all over the country.

The big private sector organizations usually govern textiles industry frequently with considerable foreign sharing that mainly consist of foreign investors from countries like Hong Kong, India, the UK, Liechtenstein, the Netherlands, The USA, Japan and Columbia. Some of the mills are owned by government whereas some are owned by domestic Nigerian Companies. For example, African Nigeria Plc. is part of the world-wide Kewalram/Chenrai family having their business set-ups in North America, the UK, West Africa, South Asia and East Asia. Spintex Mills (Nigeria) Limited (SMNL) is wholly owned by Sunflag (Nigeria) Limited, the textiles company producing knitted fabrics and ready made apparels having considerable interests in Kenya, Tanzania, Cameroon, India and the UK.

Stallion Textile Industries Limited which is the largest producer of excellent quality yarns is part of the Stallion Group which is diversified sectors like agriculture, commodities, manufacturing, automobile assemblies, real estates, constructions, banking, deep-sea fishing and shipping in West Africa, Europe and Asia. The owners of Stallion are Vaswani brothers Sunil Vaswani, Haresh Vaswani and Mahesh Vaswani.

United Nigeria Textiles Plc. manufactures high quality African Prints, Java Prints and Real Wax Prints in addition to Polyester Cotton Printed and dyed fabrics for domestic consumptions. Their products are also being exported to nearby ECOWAS countries while high quality grey fabric is exported to the USA, Europe and Asian markets. The company has vertically integrated production set-ups including synthetic fibres and filaments, spinning, weaving, real wax printing and even dyeing.

Government Policy: The government is exercising some intricate efforts of reinstating some stability in industry. Measures including tracking the smuggled imports, reduced import duties on raw materials, restrictions on imported fabrics and mandatory domestic purchase by government sectors are already declared by the government. However, according to the industry tycoons more rigorous efforts are yet highly required.

Existing position: According to the reports, textiles industry employment has ditched to nearly 70% since 1996, as a result approximately around 150,000 people are rendered jobless. Also the local mills stake in the domestic market is merely 25% which is swiftly declining, losing due to cheaper imports. Furthermore, the incidental losses for the major amount of dependants are also rising. Due to the intermittent power supply conditions many textiles units are dependant on diesel power generating sets for production activities, where due to consecutive increase in diesel rates the feasibility of such methods raise serious questions. Other recurring issue faced by these units is availability and cost of water. During the year 2004 Nigeria and Benin signed the border agreement treaty which has rose to some anxiety for textiles industry which is already facing the offensive cross border imports.

As per agreement, goods have to pass through freely across borders. Despite of government restrictions on import of clothes, huge amount of second-hand clothes are regularly imported from the Far East countries that cause serious consequences. Many units are closing down as per the local press reports. A few of such closed textile mills include Arewa Textiles which is under receivership of Union Bank Plc., Afprint Plc., Enpee, Five Star, Gaskiya, Aba Textiles, Specomill and Zamfara Textiles. Finetex and Northex at Kaduna owned by Aminu Dantata are also closed down because of extended losses. However, some of properly managed mills with adequate financial resources yet exist most successfully inspite of various constraints faced by textiles industries. Stallion Textiles which is division of strong Stallion Group headed by Sunil Vaswani is functioning moderately well in its yarn production process due to their investments in the most advanced tooling sectors.

Conclusion: The conditions surrounding textiles industry demand for immediate interference by the government to curb the quick declining curve of industry destiny through the synchronized approach in consultation with industry members. The producers and the other sub-sectors require highlighting on implementation of advance technology for enhancing costs, improved coaching and administration and appropriate monetary reformations.
Reference:
www.textilesnigeria.com