The Minister of Communications, Barr. Abdur-Raheem Adebayo
Shittu has said his ministry is leveraging on Information Communication
Technology (ICT) for rejuvenating Nigeria’s economy as well as encouraging
massive online job creation through the implementation of various initiatives,
reports ITRealms.
In a press statement by Victor Oluwadamilare, his Special
Assistant on Media, the minister, in a keynote delivered at the opening
ceremony of the Ife Youths Economic Summit (IYES 2017) Thursday, at Ile-Ife
said, in this onerous task, 28,800 unemployed youths nominees across various
states of the Federation were trained in online job (Micro-work and E-lancing).
The ministry, he also said has established incubation hubs
in Lagos and Calabar, which are a private and public sector collaboration aimed
at catalysing the ICT industry by helping Nigerian ICT entrepreneurs create
successful businesses, support the interactions between innovations and their
partners and developing indigenous skills and capabilities. H e added that the
target of this initiative is to create 25 successful ICT businesses by 2015.
Striving to make the ICT sector, the 4th pillar of the
nation’s economy in terms of contributions to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP),
he said the sector, which is the fastest growing and which has contributed 9.58
percent to the country’s GDP, trained 1000 Girls in ICT in collaboration with
Huawei Technologies and have sent 20 best amongst the 1000 girls already in
Nigeria to China in April this year for further training.
Barr. Shittu said in its efforts to fill the about 24
percent IT vacancies in the country, the ministry “plans to build technical and
job-ready ICT skills to replace expatriate expertise with highly skilled
Nigerians, increase the supply of local highly skilled talent to a fast growing
sector and enhance ICT industry employment opportunities.
He said, “ so far, Digital Bridge Institute and other tertiary
institutions are concluding an agreement with IBM (Skills Development and
Research Institutes) to train 25,000 resources in 5 years (2013-2018) per
institute.
“Similarly, partnership agreement had been signed with Cisco
to build Cisco Academy for highest certification (CCIE: Cisco Certified
Internetworking Expert) in Nigeria and with Nokia on MLab Project. The
implementation of the Nokia Life programme for farmers is also at an advanced
stage.
“The modules to be covered in the one month following my opening
addresses have been carefully chosen; software development which is at the
foundation of ICT because you need to write the instruction for the computer in
a language it will understand, the study of various electronics technologies
which include computer hardware& software, operating systems,
web-based
information and applications, telephones and other telecommunication and
multimedia products, e-commerce is the buying and selling of goods and services
over the internet and web enabling technologies which are products that can be
used through or in conjunction with the world wide web to surf the internet.”
Speaking at the Summit, Barr. Shittu said that youths are
cardinal members of the internet ecosystem and that the ministry is
strategically inclined to bringing up initiatives to cater for the interest of
the nation’s youth population and working closely with various partners at
national, regional and global levels to ensure massive youth employment while
fast-tracking the rejuvenation of the national economy.
He said the theme of the summit, “ICT as a Formidable Tools
For Nigeria’s Economic Rejuvenation and Massive Job Creation”, is apt at this
time that the country is moving out of recession and all hands are on deck to
ensure gradual economic growth.
According to the minister, ICTs are creating new job
opportunities and making labour markets more innovative, inclusive, and global
and that there is a shift from traditional labour intensive jobs to
technology-enabled jobs, adding that the ICT sector has come to play a critical
role in the sustainable growth and development of nations.
Ayo Midele/GEE
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