A phoenix rising? The regeneration of the Ghana garment and textile industry

Abstract

Some African countries’ premier industries, such as textiles, garments and agro-processing, which floundered in the face of market liberalization and stiff competition from cheap imports, are now going through regenerative changes, with some beginning to tell a cautionary tale of a leap upwards. Focusing on the Ghana garment and textile industry, we draw on a framework that integrates social practices and everyday general-purpose technologies to explore the rise, decline and regeneration of the industry. Explicating a fine analysis of how the performative reconfiguration of social practices and functional sources of innovation and technologies may combine to support innovation-driven growth, our study sheds light on how loosely connected actors within a hitherto floundering industry can learn to transform their situated practices to drive their ‘industrial regeneration’. Implications for the theory and practice of industrial regeneration are outlined.

IKKente: Fusion of Ikat Technique into Asante Traditional Kente Weaving

“…From the mid-1970s, the textile sub-sector of Ghana dominated the manufacturing sector and contributed significantly to the livelihood of Ghanaians employing about 25,000 workers [1]. This was once a booming industry but has not received the needed patronage in recent years [2].…”

“…The Trade Liberalisation reforms among West African countries hastened the demise of many textile factories in Ghana largely due to the importation of textiles and other apparel. Inadequate infrastructure, obsolete machinery, lack of trained manpower, decentralized and fragmented nature of the industry, besides https://doi.org/10.31881/TLR.2023.092 the inflexible labour laws, are the in-house challenges facing the textiles industry in Ghana [1].…”