Analysis of lean manufacturing waste in the process flow of ready-to-wear garment production in Nigeria

Abstract

The cluster of small- and medium-scale garment industries in Aba and Onitsha positioned Nigeria to meet her garment needs. Regrettably, the production process is encumbered with manufacturing waste, which hinders competitiveness with their international counterparts. This study identified manufacturing waste in the garment production process in the garment industries in Aba and Onitsha with the view of improving the production performance. A survey research design with the use of a closed-ended questionnaire was used for data collection. In total, 372 questionnaires were administered, and 324 were completed and returned, representing 87% response rate. Descriptive statistics such as mean weighted scores was used to analyze the data for this study with the Statistical Package for Social Sciences, version 16. The result of the investigation revealed that unnecessary motion, overprocessing, inventory, waiting, and defects constitute major lean manufacturing wastes in the garment production process. Therefore, concerted efforts must be intensified by the garment industry to eliminate the identified waste with a view of ensuring the garments are competitive with foreign garments.

Keywords

• industry
• lean manufacturing
• production process
• ready-to-wear garment
• waste