Johnson Bolatito’s Adire fabrics hung across the clothesline, swaying gently in the direction of the morning wind. Moments earlier at her cottage in Itoku area of Abeokuta, Ogun State capital, she had arranged the fabrics carefully across the twine to form a mélange of colours suspended into the firmament like a rainbow.
Ms Bolatito moved gently through a heap of clothes submerged in coloured water, unperturbed by the roaring sounds of an impending downpour. Away from the open verandah of the cottage, a cloud of steam escapes into the skies from a black pot of hot water placed on the edge of a nearby gutter. Beside the pot lie a few plastic buckets, and some metres away stood yet another black pot filled with water.
“We need water to make the coloured patterns come out well,” Ms Bolatito says in her native Egba dialect, her eyes fixated on the clothing materials.
“Making and designing Adire can be very stressful, as you’d see, but the result is always beautiful. Of course, we make good money from it, too.”
Inside the old houses adjacent to the popular Kampala Market in Itoku area of Abeokuta, capital of Ogun State, there are numerous Egba women designing traditional Adire clothing materials.
Ms Bolatito, 46, is one of them. She earns a living from the art of Adire cloth-making. She speaks to PREMIUM TIMES in the company of Jumoke, 38, another entrepreneur at the Itoku cottage.
“This is what I do, from which I feed myself, send my children to school and enjoy life,” says Jumoke, who would not give her second name.
“Many of the people doing this business have done very well for themselves, building houses and all that. Many of those who make the biggest money are those who can invest enough capital into the business.”
Jumoke refers to wealthy suppliers and owners of the big shops at popular Adire markets in Abeokuta, such as the Kampala Market, Panseke Market, Osiele Market, and other major markets in the ancient city.
“Many of those women are directly involved in the processing and designing like we do here,” she says, grinning. “But you may not know until you see them ‘get dirty’ inside coloured water here.”
From the sale of Adire, Jumoke told PREMIUM TIMES she has used the proceeds to support her family since her husband lost her job at the height of the Covid-19 crisis.
“Adire making is a good business, and depending on how much patronage we get, the proceeds could run into tens of thousands of naira monthly,” she says.
From a modest kiosk in Itoku, Jumoke says she has since expanded her supply chain to other markets in Abeokuta and beyond. She has equally brought in two of her cousins as aides, including three students of the local Moshood Abiola Polytechnic, Abeokuta.
Boosting Earnings
Nigeria relies on oil and gas for more than 80 per cent of its foreign exchange. Experts have argued that the country can boost its forex earnings by diversifying its revenue base to hedge the economy against the instability of the oil market.
The women producing Adire are not only creating a livelihood for themselves and their families, but are helping in their own way to boost Nigeria’s foreign exchange earnings as their products are patronised well beyond Nigeria’s shores.
Adire is quite popular across West Africa. In Nigeria, its production is common among the Egba women entrepreneurs in the South-western part of the country.
Historically, export of the fabric was tied to the formation of Adire makers associations in different parts of Yorubaland, stemming from the complex problem they experienced in Abeokuta in the 1920s.
According to Bukola Oyeniyi, a postdoctoral research fellow at the Department of Political Studies and Governance, University of Free State, South Africa, attempts at solving these problems brought about two important developments: the introduction of new methods to Adire production, and the influx of many people into the business.
On account of these developments, patronage dropped, thus destroying the industry. Exports fell from £500,000 before 1928 to £150,000 by the mid-1930s, according to records from the National Archive, Ibadan.
In the years that followed, Adire cloth production and export became intertwined with that of cocoa production in Nigeria and Ghana. Again, when cocoa prices plummeted in 1937, the inability of farmers to continue to purchase Adire led to the decline of the industry.
In recent years, there have been conscious efforts to encourage export and spread the local fabrics to different parts of Africa and beyond.
Various styles of the fabric have been exported to markets in the United States, United Kingdom, Asia, and international airports around the world where Adire is sold at premium prices.
Adire fabrics are equally well sold at tourist centres, where merchants buy local materials at higher prices.
In Abeokuta, Iyabo Sodipe, an Adire trader, told PREMIUM TIMES that she exports the fabric to Ghana, Mali, and Ivory Coast, from where she makes as much as $1,215 annually.
“With better incentives and government support, we can do better and export Adire to many parts of Africa and the world and earn good foreign exchange,” she said.
Sayo Jacob, an Osogbo-based trader, said she told nearly $500 worth of Adire in 2019, but could not do much in 2020 due to the pandemic.
Traders, however, complain about the difficulty of exporting the designs, blaming bureaucracy and cost.
