Science Technology and Innovation (STI) is the premise upon which developed nations of the world have continued to dominate the global socio-economic landscape in all the varied sectors that shape the historical circumstances of the modern time.
The cutting-age technology of the contemporary times and accompanying products have created competitive value for countries with such technological advantage and given them an edge.
The drive of the Nigerian government to join the league of the technologically-advanced countries of the world prompted the government to take significant steps to improve Nigeria’s global competitiveness status through the use of STI in order to attract foreign exchange earnings.
This was the focus of Tuesday’s flag of the National Dialogue on the Establishment and Implementation of Technology and Innovation centres for Global Competitiveness and Productivity in Abuja with the theme “Achieving Nigeria’s Competitiveness and Improved Foreign Exchange Earnings through Science, Technology and Innovation”.
The programme was geared towards the Implementation of Presidential Executive Order NO.5. One of the objectives of the Executive OrderNO.5 is to propagate the vital role of STI in National Economic Development, particularly, in the area of promoting “made in Nigeria goods and services’’.
Minister of science, technology, and innovation, Dr. Adeleke Olorunnimbe Mamora, who declared the dialogue open, said that STI is key to economic recovery and growth. He added that the economic transformation of the country should be a measure of readiness to move the nation to greater heights.
The government followed it up on Wednesday with the establishment of six technology innovation centers in the six geo-political zones of the country to enhance collaboration of researchers which is necessary for achieving the desired research output in the country, rather than working in silos.
The Technology and Innovation Centres, under the Executive Order NO. 5 are designed to serve as centres of excellence with the objective of improving the role of STI in the socio-economic development of the country.
Nigeria appears to show willingness to harness its potential in this sector to support the monetary, fiscal as well as trade policies for a better and improved economy. It has the wider opportunity to show responses to change, and collaborate with investors and firms thereby enhancing social safety net protection and sound financial institutional framework tailored towards economic transformation of the country.
Usually, innovation ecosystems of a country are geared towards generation of ideas, translation into products, and the commercialisation of products on a large scale. Therefore, the success of this is dependent on several factors such as strong knowledge-generation areas, universities, research centers and laboratories.
However, there seems to be no linkage and active collaborations between these knowledge centers and commercial businesses and that is where the challenge has been for Nigerians in recent times.
According to an ICT expert, Hanniel Jafaru, Nigeria’s “quest for global competitiveness is a good dream but the country is suffering from the harsh realities of its poor policies and programmes towards STI as its school system is not designed to achieve the desired results.”
He also said that STI requires massive investment which must be consistent with the Research and Development component, without which no idea no matter how great, can be turned into a valuable product.
Nigeria’s research institutes have not been forthcoming with innovative products perhaps due to poor funding and this has manifested in the position of the country in the global pecking order of STI. Nigeria depends almost entirely on other countries of the world for its technology with heavy price.
Perhaps the most critical sector of Nigeria’s life is the oil and gas sector, which depends largely on foreign technology to exploit. The government can use the Executive Order NO.5 platform to integrate modular refineries into the system to curb vandalization and oil theft in the oil and gas industries.
The government might have good intentions but success in this area depends on a drastic effort and commitment towards developing Nigeria’s indigenous STI to enable the country to look inwards for technological breakthroughs.
Nigeria can also leverage the support of the UNESCO, which has promised to collaborate with the ministry in some areas of STEM, and research, thereby, making one of the agencies of the Ministry a UNESCO capacity centre.
But the country must first reorganise its school curricula to align with the demands of modern technology and innovation and above all invest massively in its research institutes. Otherwise, the nation may continue to lag behind for many years to come.
