The Nigerian Textile Manufacturers Association (NTMA) has sought urgent government intervention to salvage the ailing textile sector. It revealed, the sector has already lost over 117,000 jobs in the past 26 years and could lose more if the government does not intervene.

Folorunsho Daniyan, President, NTMA says, the Nigeria textile industry once used to be the highest employer in the country. In the 80’s it employed 500,000 workers which reduced to 137,000 workers in 1996, 24,000 workers in 2008. Today, it employs less than 20,000 workers. Daniyan further states, earlier directed to West and Central Africa, Nigerian textile exports reached their lowest ebb in 2006. However, they recovered in 2007 and 2008. Today, the country’s textile have reached zero. He attributes this decline to the loss of preferential market access in the EU and US, inconsistent implementation of Export Expansion Grant policy, particularly a perennial backlog of EEG claims, and the inconsistencies in the implementation of ECOWAS Trade Liberalization Scheme.