Trouble ahead in an industry with rich potential for the continent. THE textile industry in Ghana, one of the economic sectors that has attracted the President''s Special Initiative (PSI), is at a low ebb, losing 300 billion cedis (US35m) in revenue in 2002 through smuggling and under-invoicing, reports the Ghanaian Chronicle.

There are also difficulties in the textile industries of other African countries, it emerged this week. At a recent workshop in Accra, Ghana''s revenue agencies governing board, which made the disclosure, hinted at the likelihood of an even bigger loss this year.

To show how low the once vibrant industry had sunk, it was revealed that total local production, which peaked at 130-million metres annually in the 1970s, had dropped to less that 39-million metres. The trend has resulted in the reduction of the labour force from 25000 to fewer than 3000 now.

The board said the problem of under-invoicing derived from high import duties, laxity in the performance of the valuation and monitoring functions of the destination inspection agencies and ineffective customs activities at the country''s frontiers. The adverse effects on the economy had been many and varied.