The Director-General, Nigerian Textile Manufacturers Association, Mr. Jaiyeola Olanrewaju, in this interview with Sulaiman Adenekan, speaks on the disbursement of the Cotton and Textile Revival Fund for the revitalisation of the textile industry.

What is your opinion on the establishment of N70bn Textile Development Fund?

The origin of the loan was for the textile manufacturing industry, but again, when Mr. President made the announcement in 2006, he specifically mentioned textile manufacturers, but textile manufacturing alone cannot be on its own, because it needs some raw materials.

Even if they are producing textile and the raw materials are not available, what do you do, than to set up a committee, Revival Fund Implementation Committee.

When the committee made further investigation, they tell you that, unless the cotton industry is also built up, even if they build up the textile manufacturing sector, then we will not make a headway.

It was then the committee recommended to government that there should be a provision for cotton industry, and it was approved.

That is why you have additional N20bn, it was formally N50bn textile revival fund.

The committee was headed by the Minister of Finance, the then President approved additional N20bn.That is why you have N70bn for the Cotton Textile Revival Fund.

We, the textile manufacturers, raise no objection because that is our raw material, we just want to ensure the survival of the industry.

How will the N70bn be allocated among the member companies?

The N70bn will definitely go into some important areas. For example, if you are talking of cotton, it will be meant for cotton production. When you are talking about the farmers, ginnery, that is, those who are buying from the farmers and making it into cotton link, and then for cotton merchants, that buy ginnery and sell it to the manufacturers.

For the manufacturers, it will take care of machine refurbishment, working capital and other things that will enable the industry come back to production.

When will the money be allocated?

We were with the Managing Director of the Nigerian Export Import Bank recently, the thinking is that there could be disbursement before the end of the first quarter of the year, because there are still some procedure been put together. The money is going to be put together by the United Bank for Africa. So, UBA is going to make the money available to NEXIM that will now administer the money.

So, it is when the money is made available to NEXIM that disbursement will start. Currently, they are working on all necessary procedures and we are of the opinion that by the end of the first quarter of the year, it will be disbursed.

Is this initiative by the government worth commending?

Definitely, we should commend the government, because if you listen to comments after the meeting when the government approved this fund, they also decided on some other services that will make it work, like Low Pour Fuel Oil otherwise known as black oil. Government has given instructions to the Minister of Energy to ensure that this is made available, and the minister has said that the Kaduna Refinery is likely to come on board this month or next month, that is a major source of LPFO. So, if it comes on board, that means LPFO will be available in the country, and we are also saying that as they are working on LPFO, they should also work on gas, because gas is the alternative to LPFO. Some people have converted to gas instead of LPFO. So, the two of them go hand-in-hand.

We are also appealing to the government that something should be done to ensure that we have regular supply of gas. The two of them are affected by vandalism. We are of the opinion that government should do extra work to get gas on stream.

Which member company of NTMA will benefit from the loan?

I wouldnt be able to say which company is going to benefit. What I will say is that all textile manufacturers are qualified or have access to the loan, once they meet the criteria stated by NEXIM because it is a loan, and NEXIM has the responsibility to give loans to those who have met the criteria.

Those who meet the criteria will automatically get the loan, but I cant say who and who among our members will get it. It is open to all members and it is not only textile manufacturers, we have also garment manufacturers.

What are the criteria for accessing the loan?

I will not be able to tell you the criteria, it is NEXIM that can do that, they are the one issuing out the loan, but I think that the general requirements by any commercial bank will surely apply. That is, having your tax clearance, certificate of incorporation, statement of account for may be two or three years. All these are standard requirements for any loan. So, NEXIM is going to ask for that, whether they will ask for additional things I wouldnt know.

What is your advice to the government on the development of the non-oil sector and the manufacturing sector in particular?

Government should do all things possible to make sure that infrastructure is right because we have a problem. The problem is if you want to export, you have to be competitive. As of today, the Asian countries have taken over the whole world especially, China, and if you want to compete with China, then your prices have to be competitive.

They have overrun our market, because if you go to our market almost 80 per cent of fabric being sold in this country are smuggled into the country, and 90 per cent of those 80 per cent are Chinese goods.

They come here, take your samples and designs the next few week they are her with that type of fabric, fake or no fake, poor or good quality. So government should make sure that infrastructure is right. Electricity like everybody knows have to be overhauled.

Like we are talking of LPFO, it as work, black oil is needed by almost all manufacturing companies for their boilers, textile, cement and brewery company use it. So government have to ensure that this is available.

The other issue is importation of all types of goods, this is affecting our production, so their should be some element of restriction. If we are saying that there is no prohibition of goods coming in, even in United States, they dont prohibit, but put in place some measures to curtail importation, you can bring it in but there are conditions to bring it in ,and if you dont meet those conditions to bring it in, you cannot import into those countries

Their should be a change of orientation of the average Nigerian that anything imported is better than average Nigeria goods. That is one of the problems we have, I think standard organization is working on that ,to ensure that all goods that come into the country legally meet some standard, unfortunately with textile, they are coming in and Standard Organisation of Nigeria can not work seriously on it, because they are not coming in legally.

SON cannot go to the port and say let us see the textile coming in because they dont come in through the normal channel, they are being smuggled into the country. This are some of the things I think government should put right.

And on the issue of exportation, their was this export expansion grant, which was suspended, they are just reopening. it is necessary that government have to do something about it, because that export expansion grant is more or less already compensate for the deficiency we have in our infrastructure, which make our cost of production go up. That issue should really be looked into by government to ensure that it is brought back to what it was, to encourage export, because unless we go into this non-oil export, it might be difficult to cope, because the oil industry is a wasting asset, something have to be done to no-oil export