‘Printing industry can generate huge funds, if properly harnessed’

The Nigerian printing industry is an enormous and promising industry suffering from serial challenges. BABATUNDE MARK-ANTHONY,CEO/managing director of JPAAC Printing and Packaging Limited takes a critical look at these challenges and other issues the printing sector is grappling with in this interview with PETER OLOWA, TELIAT SULEand PETER EHIGIATOR. Excerpts:

 In the last few years, how has the government treated stakeholders in the printing industry?

The Nigerian printing industry has a body that is called the Chartered Institute of Professional Printers of Nigeria, (CIPPON). Over the years, it is like either the government does not know the importance of the printing industry, or the ministers are not interested in the sector. As a pioneer member of the institute, we have had series of meetings with the previous ministers to highlight the challenges facing the industry.

Nigeria is in recession today, and people are talking about diversification in agriculture and other sectors, but nobody seems to be talking about the printing industry.

This is an industry that can generate a lot of funds too; it can save this country a lot of money. If you care to know, there is nothing in this business that is locally sourced for. In printing, everything is imported.  Why is the government not looking into it?  In fact, a nation without paper is no nation, because that is a major source of information; information that goes down the record.  Why are we not paying attention to the industry?

I was listening to the minister of finance, Kemi Adeosun recently.  While being asked a few questions, she itemised what could be done to revive the economy and she mentioned that the era of printing flamboyant brochures is over.  This is because the government wants to save cost, which sounds very reasonable to me.

No matter how you look at it, computer cannot displace printing. Printing will remain, and technology is advancing in this sector every year. For instance, if you want to hold a conference at an exact time and you want a programme immediately, there are machines that can dish the programme out within the shortest time.

What are we doing to encourage those who are in the sector? A lot of people come to see some of our works and they say wow!  They are amazed at the quality of product packs produced here.  When you go into some of the shopping malls, pharmacies in Nigeria and see all those products, you would be thinking they were imported, but they are done here locally.  

We are not relenting on the quality of our prints, since we believe that we must also always match with the international standard.  Look, that material I gave to my graphic artist to work on, the company that brought the work was importing it before, but right now they can no longer do so because of the cost of importation and high exchange rate.  They brought the work here based on recommendation and they get the same result they get when printed outside the country.

 

What are the different segments in the printing industry?

We have commercial printing, like those who print invoices, receipt booklets, etc. We also have the packaging, and packaging is also divided into two segments. Each of those segments can also be broken down into light packaging and heavy packaging. These are the corrugated types- those who do cartons for packing fridges and other big products.  In fact, a lot of corrugated packaging companies in Nigeria are dead now due to forex issues; the Indians and Lebanese used to dominate this kind of business.

We have the advertising part of printing, like the billboards and so on. There is no how you can start from printing without getting a graphics, which is the first step.  If you want to be a good printer, you must have a good graphics setting as well.

The technology today is taking us into so many dimensions. For instance, there is a technology now that will print straight on your mounted billboard against the conventional way of printing on flex before mounting. It is a mobile printer. Now, to get this facility is capital intensive.

How many printing firms do we have in the country and can they handle demand?

It is not the question of the number of printing outfits we have. Our problem is putting a square peg in a round hole. If you have five and they all have the capacity, they will deliver.  But the question again is, has the government made an effort to see that we are not printing from outside the country? Take the minister of information for instance; how much does he know about the printing industry? The minister of works may not know either.  But give him somebody who has worked in the print media as an adviser, there will be a turn around.

What bothers me is not even the fact that our people patronise foreign printing industry, but let the bulk of it be done here in Nigeria.

Government feels that security documents should be printed abroad.  Even if they are printed abroad, are they as secured as we think? Some of these things printed out are more expensive than when printed in Nigeria. Government should put good policies on ground that can encourage and project local industries to strive. Printing business is capital intensive, the machines, the paper, the ink and other materials are now very expensive.

 

Why can’t Nigeria produce some of these materials locally?

About 10 to 15 years ago, we had Nigerian Paper Mills located at Jebba. We had the Oku-Iboku Pulp and Paper Manufacturing Company in Akwa Ibom State and Iwopin Paper Mill in Ogun State. The Federal Government invested so much in these three companies. The Nigerian Paper Mills can be compared with any mill in Brazil.  If you are a staff of that company you do not go out looking for anything.  They had standard hospital, school for staff children, clubs, and so on. The same also goes for Uku Iboku Paper Mills. Jebba was to produce craft liner; Uku Iboku was to produce newsprint, while Iwopin was to produce fine paper (bond and blank paper).  They were standard mills that could compete with any mill companies internationally.

For some time, Daily Times was using newsprint produced by Oku Iboku. But some Nigeria businessmen killed Uku Iboku, when they refused to use Uku Ibok newsprints, claiming that Uku Iboku newsprint was not good enough. They said it was carrying spots and brownish, etc.  The same complaints were also made against Jebba and Iwopin. Their mills’ forests had millennia planted everywhere. You will see some of these trees if you are travelling to Benin, Edo State.  Those trees today have become firewood. If the government had managed those companies well, by now, we would have been self-sufficient in paper; that is just the truth.

 

Since there are huge opportunities for players in the industry, is it not possible for CIPPON to rally round and buy the paper mills and make them work?

The paper mill is not a business for an individual. It is expensive and it is government that can own a paper mill. I know all the paper mills have been sold since five years ago, but where are they today?  I think those that bought them must have realised now they were mere liabilities; otherwise, they should have been producing.

 

What can government do to help stakeholders in the industry?

Government should consider giving duty-free for all printing materials.  They should think of banning all printing from abroad. The government should also give Nigerians a chance.  For instance, if you have a book and you want the government press to print 1,000,000 copies, they will tell you they do not have the capacity to print such volume of work, because they know they can print abroad. This is a serious challenge we are facing in the industry.  It also goes beyond dollar exchange; the government needs to stop this anomaly in the printing industry and other sectors too.

 

Is it true that most of the machines used here are from Germany?

Before, the Germans dominated the printing equipment industry. But as of today, China, India and Brazil to mention a few, are also into manufacturing of printing equipment.  I have some machines that I bought from China over 10 years now, they are still working perfectly, and they work virtually on a daily basis. There is a three-in-one machine I have, imported from China, it does fuelling, embossing and cutting, and we have been using it since the beginning of the year. Germans products are good; there is no doubt about that. Their machines are very big and expensive; they have not been able to cut down the size of the machines they produced, but the Chinese and the Indian technologies can compress the same machines and make them smaller sizes; you will still get same result.

 

Apart from China, India and Germany what other countries does Nigeria import printing machines from?

Brazil and United Kingdom also produce good printing machines but majority of the materials we use as at today come from China. Germany, Brazil and Indian used to dominate the market, though they are still very much around but 9 out of 10 of printing materials used in Nigeria today come from China and India.

I have been to where they manufacture quality paper in China. But the funny thing is that, some of our importers will go there to tell them to reduce the quality because of cost.  For instance, where you are supposed to have 80 grams of paper, they will ask the Chinese to reduce it to 65 – 70 and still label it 80 grams for people to buy. But if you go there yourself, they will give you the type of quality you want.

 

What kind of training does one need to become a professional in the industry?

I must be very honest with you; the industry is backward in so many areas. Long before now, people who engaged themselves in printing happened not to be professionals. These were people who just joined the printing industry in order to make money. I am a professional.  Apart from my training in the UK, I worked for the Daily Times Group of Company for 20 years before I started my own.  We are backward as far as training is concerned in the industry.

Over the years, I have trained countless numbers of people from my company.  For instance, if you come in with a secondary school certificate, I will make sure that you continue your education while you are working here.  There are some of my staff who are doing their part time programme in the higher institution.  I encouraged and gave them the opportunity to do so, like my driver is now running his HND in accounting.

Either you go to school or not, once you are in my company, we have to train you for five years on the job before you are allowed to operate the machines. If I am not satisfied within the five years of training that you can now handle printing work effectively, I will extend it to six years.  An illiterate can never be a good printer. What is the need of an operator who cannot read? How would he know when there is a mistake in a client’s work, he will go on printing and the end result will be a waste of time and resources.

 

Do banks give the industry stakeholders credit facilities?

Even if the banks are ready, I do not think anybody will be ready to collect any loan because of the high interest rates.

For our members, we have set up a cooperative society under ASSPON.  We thought of how to assist ourselves because of the hardship in the economy, especially the smaller printers. We decided to float a cooperative society. We have started giving out loans to members.  There are some printers who will get a job worth N300,000 and they do not have N200,000 to execute the job, the cooperative will help them to raise the money.

Now, even though the government is in support of the cooperative society, how much are they putting into these cooperative societies to make sure that they are functioning properly?