The Federal Government has said it is creating the enabling environment to unlock opportunities in the digital skills market in sub-Saharan Africa valued at $130 billion.
Director General, National Centre for Technology Management (NACETEM), Dr Olusola Odusanya, who stated this at the ongoing 8th Technology and Innovation Expo in Abuja, assured that the country’s industrial growth and technology advancement is imminent and inevitable.
According to the International Finance Corporation, 28 million jobs in Nigeria and 230million jobs in Sub-saharan Africa will require digital skills by 2030 in a market valued at $130billion.
Addressing participants at the expo, Dr Odusanya said the government has come up with NACETEM Academy that will train people on digital and other skills.
The NACETEM chief executive said the academy will provide Nigeria with an innovation finishing school for both public and private sectors of the national economy, stressing that “digital economy is Nigeria’s new oil.”
His words: “The industrial growth and technological advancement of Nigeria is imminent and inevitable. NACETEM Academy has arrayed a growing and significant bouquet of self-paced international skills certification courses that would help these digital natives to excel in a digital economy which promises to be Nigeria’s new oil.”
Odusanya said the rate at which Nigeria needs to produce these individuals would need to be rapid and efficient and intentional as skilled workers ready for the future of work from day one will be in high demand.
He said out of a total of 215 million active GSM subscribers, there are over 25 million youths who need to boost their career, by acquiring new skills, improve their career progression, job mobility and international competitiveness.
“This captive population is young, English educated, and hungry for technology and consume technology rapidly but require a higher degree of digital literacy,” he said.
According to him, Tech Advantage is another initiative that has digitilized the indigenous Igbo apprenticeship scheme as well as Lagos GSM village knowledge transfer models to increase the value of its job creativity through the use of Information Communication Technology (ICT) to increase the deliverables of the schemes and increase its reach within the general Nigerian populace.
He revealed that among the training opportunities being developed in the NACETEM Academy are training and certification for new generation skippers, second engineers, mariners and boat builders while commercial opportunities are being married with social business strategies to create a skilled workforce that would exploit the huge potentials of the marine and blue economy.
“NACETEM’s Mandate includes technology infusion, training of middle and high-level manpower in Science Technology and Innovation, Conducting STI Policy research, policy analysis and policy briefs to allow government take data driven decisions, establish and run databases on STI, providing access to other STI databanks and collaborate with other countries on STI developments among others.
“In realization of this mandate, the need to use transformative technologies is pertinent. Annually, NACETEM will focus on a few sectors of the national economy and bring its mandate to bear in order to engage and achieve distinguishing economic value in that sector using the best approaches of STI governance. This year NACETEM is focusing on the Marine and Blue economy and ICT digital literacy and digital citizenship,” he stated.
