Do you know how much ladies spend on hair? Human hair from shrines in India, human hair from people in Brazil? The amount we spend on artificial hair as Nigerian women, as African women, runs into billions. What happened to our natural hair? People admire our natural hair, yet we have shifted our consumption patterns towards artificial beauty.
Changing Consumption Patterns:
Our economy is what it is because our consumption pattern has been changed. Imagine the impact if all Nigerian school uniforms were made from Nigerian prints. Imagine how much we would save and what would happen to our cotton industry, our textile industry, and the value of our naira.
When I visited Ghana, I noticed that they wear a lot of their prints. If we make it compulsory for our civil servants to wear Nigerian prints to work (except those in technical jobs where it may not be feasible), imagine the economic benefits. We would see a significant boost in our cotton industry and textile mills like those in Asaba and Kaduna.
Supporting Local Industries:
A Call for Self-Reliance:
We need to shift our focus to production!!! This will annoy people, particularly females, but it is a necessary truth. We spend billions on imported hair and artificial beauty products. What happened to appreciating our natural beauty?
The Impact of Foreign Consumption:
Once your consumption pattern is changed, the person producing the products you consume determines your financial future. We produce money as black people, as a nation, yet we import petrol because we can’t service our refineries. We import cars because we aren’t producing any. We import batteries, toothpicks, erasers, and even tubes and tires from Firestone Company in Liberia, owned by one family.
This is the problem in Africa. Our tastes have been changed, and we consume foreign products, making us prisoners of foreign economies. May God set us free.
I know this will anger many, but this is my thought. I am equally guilty of buying foreign things and sending children to foreign universities. However, I did not attend any foreign university. People used to come from the UK, Hong Kong, and the US to my university. The King of Saudi Arabia would send his family there, and Indians were lecturing us. We need to become a nation that produces the basic things we need.
Final Thoughts
I speak the truth, even if it means people will frown at me. At this age, I am not afraid of people who frown at me. I have enough to take care of myself until I enter my grave and for my grandchildren. That’s why I speak the truth. I don’t fear, and I don’t care. If you kill me, what will you benefit anyway?
God bless you.
