Ethiopia’s livestock and leather industries must do better says UNIDO chief
Ethiopia’s livestock and leather industries need to become more competitive if they are to fulfil their potential, the regional head of the United Nations Industrial Development Organisation (UNIDO), Mr M Alli, has said.
Speaking at the UNIDO workshop ‘Challenges and Solutions for the Ethiopian Leather Industry recently, Mr Alli stated that in spite of having more livestock than any other African nation, the country continued to perform poorly in the production of quality hides and skins, leather finishing and developing new international markets for leather and leather products.
In front of an audience of leather industry representatives, Mr Alli said the industry would continue to remain non-competitive for as long as issues such as product quality, investment in operations, marketing, external tariffs, port transaction efficiency and government incentives were ignored.
At the same time, he highlighted the country’s lack of dipping and veterinarian disease controls and the absence of village-level drying sheds with poor water supplies being singled out for particular attention. In conclusion, he stressed the need for concrete proposals and greater co-ordination between all participants in the sector to overcome these difficulties.
