By Angeline Mgbele, Bureau Chief, North
The National Agency for Science and Engineering Infrastructure (NASENI) and the National Institute for Policy and Strategic Studies (NIPSS), Kuru, Plateau State are set to collaborate on enhancing Nigeria’s digital economy footprints, empowering and creating jobs for millions of youths.
The foregoing is contained in a press statement eSigned by the Director, Information at NASENI, Olusegun Ayeoyenikan.
The Executive Vice Chairman and Chief Executive Officer (EVC/CEO), NASENI, Khalil Suleiman Halilu, disclosed this while welcoming participants of the Senior Executive Course (SEC) 46 of NIPSS who were at the Agency on Strategic Institution Study tour on Monday, April 15, 2024.
Mr. Halilu said he was elated that NASENI was identified as one of the federal government’s agencies that had all it took to empower and create job opportunities for Nigerian youths, and make the country self-reliant in manufacturing and digital economy.
Halilu said strengthening the capacity of key stakeholders in Nigeria to access, adopt and scale up technologies was an essential outcome of such cooperation and collaborations currently being undertaken by the Agency and “must be supported by the relevant offline conditions, such as an enabling policy environment, access to finance, appropriate incentives and innovation capacities.”
The Director-General of NIPSS, Prof. Ayo Omotayo, who led the delegation, said Nigerian youths could be empowered through translation of NASENI innovations to finished products and to strengthen the collaboration between the two organizations.
According to Prof Omotayo, various groups from the institute had been sent to different agencies to study how policies for national development could be developed, adding that the Group in NASENI would do a deep study on NASENI on how the Agency could help in creating job opportunities for Nigerian youths using some of its technological innovations.
He said “Nigeria cannot have good manufacturing without infrastructures and NASENI is very important in all the sectors in the country, especially in manufacturing industries. We need an Agency like NASENI to live up to expectations, we can work together with you to find means of transferring your innovations to effective job creation and youth empowerment.”
He noted that the Course 46 participants from NIPSS wanted to know the vision, mission and roles of NASENI and how they could be translated to job creation for youths in a digital economy.
