The Association of Consulting Architects Nigeria and CDK Integrated Industries Limited have called for more investment in locally -manufactured building products.

The professionals made the call at a pre-Annual General Meeting dinner hosted for ACAN by the CDK, producers of porcelain tiles and ceramic sanitary ware.

The Managing Director of CDK, Bernard Longe, said the company had distinguished itself from the competition by producing porcelain tiles and sanitary ware of export quality.

He explained that he was aware that a few local producers were producing ceramic white body tiles but were mislabelling same on their packaging and passing them off as porcelain.

“Although there are commonalities in the body materials and manufacturing process of ceramic and porcelain tiles, porcelain tiles are more expensive to manufacture than ceramic tiles and are therefore priced much higher than ceramic tiles,” he said.

He stated that porcelain tiles had some advantages over ceramic tiles, including suitability for external use in high traffic areas and more resistant to cracks or failure when not installed over solid concrete floor, among others.

“In the case of sanitary ware, which in the absence of any meaningful sustained local production had always been import dependent, the well-known authentic European brands of old have been largely driven out of the Nigerian market by virtually indistinguishable cheap inferior imitations imported from East Asia. A major advantage of buying CDK branded sanitary ware is that you have no doubt whatsoever of what quality you are buying,” he said.

The President of ACAN, Mansur Ahmadu, commended CDK for their investment in the tile and sanitary wares industry in Nigeria.

He said, “As Architects, it is always good that we are furnished with relevant information that enables us make the best decision as project managers and the information that CDK is sharing about the world class quality of their ‘Made-in-Nigeria’ porcelain tiles and sanitary wares is coming at the right time,” he said.

He stated that the association would continue to propagate the message of ‘Made in Nigeria’ porcelain tiles and sanitary ware.

Source: https://punchng.com/architects-firm-endorse-locally-manufactured-building-materials/