UN, WIFT push skills to grow fashion exports

The United Nations and Women in Fashion Tech have called for increased investment to bridge the fashion sector’s knowledge gap and support local fashion businesses to enter foreign markets, following the graduation of 30 women from the Scaling Nigerian Fashion Products for Export Across Global Markets programme.

The event, held on Monday at the Garment Consult office in Ogun State, brought together UN Women officials, facilitators, and beneficiaries, who stressed the urgent need to strengthen Nigeria’s competitiveness in the global fashion economy.

The President of Women in Fashion Tech and Chief Executive Officer of Garment Consult, Bukola Ajani, said the programme equipped participants to compete across African, European, American, and South American markets.

She said, “Today, WIFT graduated 30 women from the ‘Scaling Nigerian Fashion Products for Export Across Global Markets’ programme. We are looking into European and American markets… but mainly we are focusing on African markets… Cameroon, Ghana, Togo, Ivory Coast and the rest.”

Ajani explained that the training aimed to close technology, entrepreneurial and knowledge gaps, which she described as “so crucial to the scaling of the fashion sector in Africa.”

The President of WIFT noted that the next phase, a six-week accelerator, will focus on digital business development, export readiness, entrepreneurship and mass production, alongside access to finance and market expansion. She added that UN Women had supported the initiative from inception, offering advisory and technical backing.

The Regional Director for UN Women in West and Central Africa, Dr Maxime Houinato, who attended the event during his week-long visit to Nigeria, said the UN remained committed to helping Nigerian women scale their businesses and respond to evolving global tastes.

He said, “I’m glad I participated in this ceremony that marks the transformation from artisanal work to more industrial and scaled work in fashion design.” He added that the fashion market was becoming increasingly sophisticated, noting that “the middle class is increasing, and the taste of that middle class is changing.”

Houinato said UN Women would intensify support through design-driven capacity building and financial system linkages.

“People usually make the mistake of precipitating into the hardware. But we have determined that the soft part of the market is important. The soft part is design, knowledge and skills,” he said.

He noted that the UN was working to help WIFT connect with financial institutions and ensure that Nigerian banks understood the needs of the fashion industry. “If you don’t have the financing, your ideas will stay at home,” he stressed.

One of the beneficiaries, Chief Executive Officer of Marobs Kreations, Maria Bamigboye, said the training gave her clarity on digitalisation and positioned her brand for export.

She said, “All that I need to put this training into use is support in funding, higher training, digital tools and machines to expand my business and compete in the export world.”

A national coordinator and facilitator for WIFT, Evans Edebor, stated that the programme aligned with Nigeria’s African Continental Free Trade Area strategy, with fashion identified as a priority export sector.

Edebor added that WIFT trained the participants on “enterprise scale through digital transformation”, impact investment readiness, mass production and export readiness. He stated that the next three months would involve hands-on mentoring as the women implement their digitisation action plans.

Another facilitator and Chief Executive Officer of Time-Tell, Dr Violet Abdulkadir, said she would offer training to the participants on business structure and ethics.

Abdulkadir hailed the benefit of ethics in business, stating, “They are going to have a better-structured business and will be equipped and ready to do business both locally and internationally.”