Ogun State Government has commended Ecobank for projecting the Adire fabric as an international brand through its annual ‘Adire Lagos Experience’.
Commissioner for Culture and Tourism, Ogun State, Hon. Sesan Fagbayi, gave the commendation while addressing the media at the opening day of the 3rd edition of Ecobank ‘Adire Lagos Experience’ exhibition at the ultra-modern Ecobank Pan African Centre (EPAC).
According to the Executive Director of Commercial Banking, Ecobank Nigeria, Kola Adeleke, the exhibition is driven by the bank’s ambition to support the creative sector of the economy and the aim is to make the Adire fabric an international brand.
He said: “Adire is known to be a fabric from people in the Southwest of Nigeria. But we’ve seen most people across the country gradually imbibing that culture. So for us, the exhibition is to support the people making the Adire fabric, expose them, and make Adire become an international brand”.
Commending the bank for the exhibition, Fagbayi, said: “The fabric is synonymous to Ogun state. We are the custodians of Adire. It is an indigenous cloth, fabric from Ogun State and we have to protect it. That’s why we are happy with Ecobank for what they’re doing today, assisting us to showcase what God has given to us, protecting it, and also telling the world that this is what is good for us to be using as fabric”.
Fagbayi also said that the Ogun State government has commenced measures to address the challenge of imported adulterated Adire fabric, which poses a major threat to the local Adire industry.
He said: “The State House of Assembly have commenced steps, through our ministry, to curb the excesses or inflow of Chinese adulterated fabric.
“First and foremost, we don’t need to address it as ‘Adire Chinese’. It is never Adire because it is a print on its own that doesn’t pass through the process of how the fabric is made. The original fabric is made manually, and it passes through nine stages before it is made.
“We are working on that and a Committee has been set up with the approval of the Governor that they should go to the market, you know, look at what we can do and come up with a law, probably, though we may not have the capacity of banning it out rightly.
“We’re also taking it up with the National Assembly; the Representative Abeokuta South Federal Constituency has also raised a Bill at the National Assembly that has passed its second reading now. By the time that is done probably we will have the backing of the federal government in banning this adulterated fabric out rightly”.
