Ethiopia is the first and sixth richest country in Africa and the world respectively in terms of livestock resources. Its hide and skin products are highly valued in the international market.
However, the country has not been able to adequately benefit from its abundant resources due to various challenges, including the use of limited technology starting from the preparation and production of hide and skin to finished leather products.
As the Ethiopian Leather Industry Development Institute (ELIDI) report indicates that having 123 million livestock population, the sector has earned Ethiopia 120 million USD in 2018/19.
Having a smaller amount of livestock population, some African countries have earned more than Ethiopia. For instance, Tunisia, which has 8.4 million livestock, has earned 521.4 USD million during 2018/2019. Again, having 28.2 million livestock resources, South Africa has earned 527.7 million at the same time.
Today, because of the absence of buyers, a large amount of hide and skin are wasted across the country. Besides, it is polluting the environment and causing health problems on the community.
On the other hand, foreign companies that have a high production capacity in the country are experiencing a shortage of hide and skin, semi-finished and finished leather product supply. To fill this gap, they are running production through importing leather product raw materials from abroad.
Ethiopian Leather Industry Development Institute (ELIDI) revealed to The Ethiopian Herald that it has undertaken a number of activities to address the challenges of the leather industry through research. The institute has recently completed two research on Green Leather Processing Cluster (GLPC) and Small and Medium Enterprises Capacity Development, and Export Readiness through Industrial Cluster Development (SMECD-ERICD) and referred them to the relevant government body.
The researches were conducted due to the fact that out of 30 leather factories in the country, only 20 are operational currently. The rest are unable to continue production due to a shortage of raw materials. Most of the leather factories are located in one area and there is no single leather factory in areas where there are abundant livestock resources like SNNP and Afar states.
If applied accordingly, the research is expected to practically solve the challenges and help the country earn better from the leather industry, as to the Institute.
Mohammed Hussein, Deputy Director-General of the Leather Technology Sector at the Institute said that when the Green Leather Processing Cluster research is implemented, it will help to avoid hide/skin waste as local communities will have the opportunity to easily sell their skin/hide products to the nearby clusters. It will enable the leather factories to process 30,000 sheep and goat and 2,000 cattle skins per day.
Then again, for the manufacturers, this will significantly boost productivity with a minimized cost. This is because; the manufacturers at the cluster will share common sewage treatment, raw skin and leather, chemical warehouses, and other facilities.
In addition to manufacturing skin and leather products, extra income will be earned by converting waste products to fertilizers, soap, and other products. No waste will be released into the environment. Larger buyers are more likely to meet the market demand for manufactured products.
Hailekiros Debesay, Deputy Director-General of Shoes and Skin Products Sector at the Institute also talked about SMECD-ERICD research. He also discussed the impact of establishing 1,500, 3,600, 2,500 and 700 small and medium enterprises in Addis Ababa, Oromia, Amhara, and Tigray region.
As to him, this would enable the country to create nearly 100,000 jobs opportunities in the leather industry sector. The number of shoes produced annually would increase from 24 million pairs to 40 million pairs, the amount of bags produced yearly would also shift from 1.2 million to 2.4 million and leather goods would increase from 0.12 million to 0.3 million. Additionally, it would increase the annual transactions in the leather industry from 100 million to 400 million birr.
The Ethiopian Herald October 31, 2019
BY MULATU BELACHEW
