Ambiente to help young African talents

Organisers of global consumer trade show Ambiente Trade Show, Messe Frankfurt Exhibitions is seeking to enrol more Africans onto its Talent’s programme to as parts of strategies to get the exposed to the global handicraft economy.

According to the Vice President of Ambiente, Mrs Nicolette Naumann, the idea is to create opportunity for young people to offer exciting new ideas, products and innovations to the global handicraft sector which is projected to see a massive growth of $984.8 billion by 2023.

Speaking to the Graphic Business at the just ended Ambiente Trade and Exhibition Show in Frankfurt, Germany, Mrs Naumann indicated that, the company’s talent programme which offer free exhibition space and air fare sponsorship to identifiable talented young people to showcase their creations at the Ambiente platform had been largely dominated by mostly people from Europe and Asia, thus, Messe Frankfurt as part of its African strategy is seeking to get a lot more African talents enrolled onto the programme.

The 2019, edition of the Ambiente Show which received 36 new talents from 18 countries saw a Ghanaian, Ms Matilda Payne of MH Couture and Xtreme Upcycle as well as Malian, Ms Awa Meite who produces fashion accessories from indigenous products including cotton being the only African’s to have participated in the programme which was launched in 2001.

Sustainability

Mrs Naumann was of the view that while they would want to get a lot more African talents onto the programme, sustainability of their products are also key in helping them adaptable to the international market.

“We have seen these two talents from Africa using authentic materials to venture into these designs and this is a good way for Africa to look forward to developing products from traditional handicraft trends and trying to make them adaptable to international trends like sustainability like we see running through a lot of the European and Asian themes at the fair”, she counselled.

Messe Frankfurt, she said has strong sustainability projects where business that uses its platform must succeed, as such, “we supports their presence at the most important platform for new products and innovations and enables them to take their first steps into the consumer goods market”, she stated.

Consistency

While Africa’s participation at the fair continue to decline due to what she said was a lack of financial support for many African exhibitors, Mrs Naumann stressed that, to establish a stable economic contact with international buyers, it is important for African exhibitors to be consistent at the trade show.

“Considering that 85 per cent of exhibitors who participate in the Ambiente show comes back as returning clients, if you are not returning to the same show, the buyers feels such exhibitors are they are not reliable and you go to lose trust and money”, she said.

Africa, Mrs Naumann said has a huge potential in the global handcraft sector owing to the continent’s rich history, however, “we have come to realise that many African suppliers stop attending some of these international shows when donor support programmes which provides an avenue for them to participate comes to an end”, she stated.

She emphasised that while Messe Frankfurt would continue to engage the African market to endeavour to become consistent partners, companies should not show up at international exhibitions if they are not ready for the international market.

“What would be the use to waste money to attend an international show when you cannot go back the following year to reconnect with buyers? She queried, and urge African suppliers to endeavour to team up and form cooperatives to help them cement their place within the global handcraft economy.

Writer’s email: delarussel@gmail.com