Products development, service delivery dominate as Echono meets research committee
THE Executive Secretary, Tertiary Education Trust Fund ( TETFUND), Arch. Sonny Echono, met with the leadership and members of the Standing Committee of Research and Development early in the week over need to improve on products development and service delivery through research.
Called, Research and Development Standing Committee ( RDSC), the meeting was among other things, a forum for discussing ways to enhance research process in the country.
The RDSC of TETFUND comprised about 150 members who are working under 13 different thematic areas of focus. The Standing Committee, which is chaired by Professor Anya O. Anya, has as part of its responsibilities, facilitating Nigeria’s global competitiveness in products development and service delivery by leveraging on existing innovation processes.
Some of the thematic groups include, Agriculture, Environment and Bio- Resources, Medicine, Energy and Infrastructural Development. Others are, Education,
Pharmaceuticals, Digital Economy, Petroleum, Fossils Resources, Solid Mineral and Mining; Defense and Military; Governance as well as Social Development.
In his address, Echono expressed profound gratitude to the team for their commitment to the project, noting that Nigeria needs urgent steps to come out of its current socio- economic situation.
He said: “As you will agree with me and also, judging from the remarks by the chairman, our job is not done yet. In fact, we are still at the beginning and the task is not only significant but urgent. We have reached an important milestone in our national development that requires us taking new bearings, changing course and exploring all the alternatives to see how awe can lift this country from where it currently is.”
Adding: “There is no doubt that Nigeria has the best brains in the world. Having assembled our best and given the dare circumstances and situation that we face, my charge and my prayer and appeal before you this day is to commend Mr. President through the Minister of Education for approving the appointment of the chairman.
“The agenda, as leaders, patriots and as people who have devoted all their lives to this goal is to take the lead in designing an agenda that can fast- track this process. “I want to underline the fact that we here at TETFUND will give you everything humanly possible to support this process because we are now at that point where every institution in this country is going to tell Nigerians what they are doing and how they are contributing to improving the living condition of the people. That is something TETFUND wants to be able to showcase; that we are committed to making that investment and also, harnessing the human and natural resources and deploying them for national development. But we need you as experts and leaders to drive the process”, Echono stated.
Echono decried that Nigeria has not been able to do anything about its population growth rate even as youths’ unemployment swell. He expressed worries that while Nigeria has almost the fastest youth population growth in the world, the country’s economy does not commensurate with the
growth.
“We have the largest youth population growth in the world, yet our unemployment is also at the highest. The rate at which we are growing is not at par with our national economy which is so low. Our capacity to activate or even explore the national resource that God Almighty has endowed us with is low. We are endowed with fertile soils, good climate, rich material resources and varieties in our vegetation in various parts of the country, yet we have not been able to transform these into improving the living standard of our people; we still have one of the worse indices of development index.
“The charge, my prayer and appeal before you this morning is to first admit that we have lost time. This meeting ought to have taken place much earlier. You could recall that we lost the former chairman of the Committee, Emeritus Professor N. M. Gadzama, and it took a while in constituting the board, and as suggested by the di
rector, we decided to take bull by the horn because we have lost much ground and I am very pleased and grateful to Mr. President through the honorable Minister for approving the appointment of the chairman.
“I am now a messenger delivering this message from the Chief Visioner, President Muhammadu Buhari and the deputy, the Minister of Education and we, the body representing the flagship intervention to the country on the issues of science and technology, research and development.
“How we apply research in particular can translate all the lofty ideas we have been talking about, all the plans and even visions of the previous administration into concrete steps and actions to the extent that Nigerians will begin to feel our impacts and our country begin to transform and ultimately, Nigeria will take its pride of place in the comity of nations.
“For me, it is essentially to figure out ways in which we can fast- track this process. How do we support the ef
fort? What immediate steps do we need to take, given the meagre resources that are available to us here, in order to leverage on the opportunities existing outside among other bodies?
“All the institutions that are engaged - the Ministry of Science and Technology, the Nigeria Summit Group, all the direct contacts with the manufacturing, mining and other key sectors that will not just incubate the idea and innovations, but also translate those into goods and services for our people.”
“The immediate past President, Manufacturers Association of Nigeria ( MAN) is the Vice President of the group, and I believe that we can make bridges of collaborations, have linkages with institutions, firms and industries to see how our academic federal institutions can play central role of incubating this ideas, to be centers of innovations and see how we can take that forward.
“The mandate of TETFUND states that we have to do with tertiary Institutions as enshrined in our Act but we know that collaborations, especially with knowledgefilled bodies require partnership across board, and we are willing to stretch that to ensure that we achieve result for the benefit of our people.”
Echono expressed confident that there was ample experience across the globe to make the task of the committee easier than those who will have to start from the scratch.
“I believe that these our shared vision and goal will transform our society”, he stated.
For the new committee Research and Development Standing Committee Chairman, Professor Anya, it is possible for Nigeria to emerge from the rear so that in the next 10 years, many will look back to the day with admiration as the day Nigeria started taking science and technology serious. Anya who stressed the relevance of science and technology in reshaping Nigeria, noted that nations of the world that embraced science and technology and operationalized them as an instrument for development are now the knowledge- based societies that rule the world. I believe that it is the intention, hope and vision of all of us around this table to work towards regaining lost time.
Anya was appointed the new chairman following the demise of the immediate past chairman, Emeritus Professor N. M. Gadzama.
The highlight of the meeting was the presentation of the appointment letter of Professor Anya by the Executive Secretary TETFUND, Arc Echono. Also in attendance were the chairmen and representatives of the various committees.