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.”

This kind of programme should be very sound with analysis and is not the size of data that is available that matters but the appropriate technology deployed. We are also hoping to grow many jobs through this programme as much as we can but we need a data. Our hope is to be working on available data.

The amnesty programme is addressing the problems of the people. We also look at the entire decisions for youths who may not be able to enjoy the amnesty.”

Dr. Tarawali of FIIRO, Ibadan represented by Engineer Thierno Dially said that the occasion would offer participants useful insight on how application of ATs can be better applied in agriculture to get the end product and also boost productivity.

To add this values, he said that the people Niger Delta to add necessary technology to get desired result, saying that since agriculture with appropriate technologies has to do with value addition, there is need to create proper awareness.

According to Attah, agro products need to be properly processed and that technology has been developed for this purpose, which must be applied, pointing that Ats would help in reducing time but also will reduce minimize waste and improve waste and improve income in ago produce.

He said a partnership is currently going on between the institute and five universities on cassava research,through which they plan to increase the domestic supply of cassava by Nigeria from 50 tons to 200 tones per day. To achieve this, he said appropriate technology be deployed t through farmers in Niger Delta since they have the potentials.

Head of Research and Development, EMDI, represented by Mr. Emmanuel Bianko said that the research institute had lived up to its mandate of developing and transferring technology to the small and medium scale enterprises for proliferation.

He identified poor funding, government policies and disconnect between the researchers and user, and lack of awareness as major barriers facing themselves

“we have to get technology based on identified needs for us to maximize the need for Ats. There is also need for coordination among relevant institutions. Replication of technology has to be encourage and spare parts maintenance should be guaranteed as well,” said the HOD, adding that energy efficiency and product quality has to be ensured as well for the desired growth to be ensured in Niger Delta area.