In a strategic bid to ensure that the 2021 International Arts and Crafts (INAC) Expo meets its desired objectives, the National Council for Arts and Culture (NCAC) played host to the diplomatic community in Nigeria to a Pre-INAC dinner in Abuja.
Speaking at the occasion, the Director General, National Council for Arts and Culture (NCAC), Otunba Olusegun Runsewe, explained that the purpose of the dinner outing was to celebrate the diplomatic community in Nigeria for their unwavering support to NCAC programmes and also intimate them of Council’s preparedness to host the 2021 edition of the culture, arts and crafts expo which will be held under the theme ‘Networking Nigerian Crafts to the World’.
Runsewe revealed that INAC Expo which was initiated in 2018, was one of Council’s blue chip cultural tourism promotion offering aimed at recapturing, re-enacting and marketing the essence of the Nigerian crafts industry and its wealth creation potential at national and international levels.
Other strategic contents and interventions at each edition of INAC Expo, Runsewe further stated, include practical workshops and robust exhibitions geared towards reawakening and energising the cultural sector towards economic empowerment, information sharing, skills acquisition and overall socio economic integration of countries.
Runsewe who doubles as the President, World Crafts Council (African Region) maintained that INAC Expo had helped to sensitise investors on the need to invest in the arts and crafts sector as a way of encouraging entrepreneurship and rural communities development which had attracted investors in line with the Social Development Goals (SDGs) agenda of the present administration.
The NCAC boss therefore promised the diplomatic community that the 14th edition of INAC Expo 2021 holding from the 13th to the 15th of October at the Sheraton Hotels and Towers, would again provide the needed platform for different countries to showcase their indigenous arts and crafts through exhibitions, personal and virtual interactions while savouring the fascinating cultural goldmine in Nigeria.
Highpoint of the evening which was held at the Ladi Kwali Hall, Sheraton Hotel and Towers, Abuja, was a raffle draw where members of the diplomatic community were rewarded with various artistic gift items. There were also goodwill messages from Ambassadors of various countries and various stakeholders in the culture and tourism sector.
Runsewe presented gifts of appreciation to 25 countries and stakeholders that attended the event.
