By Emmanuel Elebeke
THE lingering environmental pollution, degradation and economic rape going on in the Niger Delta is not only attracting the sympathy of the international community, but has also started to draw the attention of some concerned oil exploration companies operating the oil rich region.

The attraction came last week for Partnership Initiatives in the Niger Delta, PIND when it organized a two days conference in partnership with the Engineers Without Borders Nigeria, to meet the needs of communities and small scale businesses in the Niger Delta region.

The conference among things was meant to raise awareness and understanding of the development and application of Ats for socio-economic development, increase the availability and quality of community infrastructure and to enable organizations, institutions and individuals with a common interest in AT to share ideas, opportunities and learning in ways which improve their capacity for applying AT concepts in their work.

The event attracted professionals from oil, engineering, agriculture, information technology and entrepreneurs.

All the presentations made at the conference centred on how use technology to support development needs, of water, power supply, food processing technology and how to boost the entrepreneurial skill of the people. Another area of focus was to look for the most suitable technology the people of Niger delta could use to achieve something tangible with their material and human resources.

Project Director, PIND, Mr. Dennis Flemming while welcoming the audience said the that the devastation cause in the region over the years through oil exploration activities called for alternation strategy to save the area from further damage. He explained that the foundation is focused on introducing the concept of discussing the appropriate technology in harnessing the potentials of the people of Niger Delta.

“through this conference, we hope to enlighten people the kind of appropriate technology applicable to lots of projects that are not functioning in the oil rich region. The reason why the region is in dare need of ATs is that the technologies used to execute old projects were not appropriate, hence the reason for their failure.

“we can’t engage the unemployed youths without the government. We have had a stakeholder meeting different stakeholder, government, civil society organizations. These are issues people want to be addressed but end up in poverty, lack of economic activity. When you pick up any of the talents, you will observe potential for employment opportunities that would generate more jobs,” said the project Director.

Also, Flemminng said: “I think, there is a pocket of changes in the area, so that we can be taking on new projects that can enhance the lives of people. We intend to look around and see how we can use the potentials around, small successes to bigger businesses. We are putting a lot of analysis into a lot more trials to start new programmes. We are trying to create jobs and economic growth within the region. We have got to try and address some of the way we can increase their goals.

“What will be appropriate to tackle. We look towards a lot of opportunities in Niger Delta. You can look into value chain, systemic culture that holds people bound we now try to introduce a pilot intervention. We share common interest in using and defying and using appropriate technology and when we recognize that need we are trying to work together.”