The Nigerian leather is well known and was world acclaimed over one thousand years ago. The city of Kano in Northern Nigeria was a mecca of sort for the leather industry and most sub- saharan African states about 40 years ago. Huge revenue was made from export of hides and skin decades ago and leather was then the second largest foreign exchange earner for the country after oil. The Kofar Wambai tannery in Kano which was the biggest in West Africa has been in existence for over one hundred years. Tanneries in Nigeria are mostly situated in the Northern region where cattle is in abundance and large expanse of land for gazing is surplus. This enables the free range animals have good skins that come out better as leather and are thus exported out to big fashion houses overseas for production of designer bags, shoes, furniture etc.
Currently, the business of leather in Nigeria has been one of round tripping. Starting out from Sokoto and Kano from the back of a goat or cow then to the local tannery, after then it is exported to Italy where modern machineries are available for processing and is shipped back to Nigeria as imported goods and customers rush to purchase it.
Despite huge potentials, leather industry in Nigeria is underperforming, and these could be due to few reasons, one of it being lack of continual sensitization of the public regarding value of hides and skin, meant to be processed into leather for making shoes, bags, belts and other revenue generating commodities now turned into meat for consumption, despite that it has no nutritive value. InNigeria, animal skindelicacy called Ponmo initially meant for people of low financial status has found its way into almost every kitchen pot and most soup recipe is incomplete without it. This is a killer for the leather industry and has to be stopped.
Leather is not all about luxury, but smell of death, urine and other tanning materials. In the middle ages, due to the unbearable smell which leather evokes, perfumes were used to scent leather in order to hide their smell. However, today perfumers now design formulations to copy the smell of leather. At Honeycrown perfumery likewise we have well designed perfumes which simulates the smell of African leather for the gentleman and elegant looking lady.