By Emmanuel Elebeke

Any  country that continues to export  her First  Class brains  to  other countries is at the risk  of not realizing its developmental goals. This was the view of the former Director General of National Office for Technology Acquisition (NOTAP), Engr. Umar Bindir at the formal launching and presentation of NOTAP Industrial Technology Transfer Fellowship (NITTF) in Abuja last week.

On First Class brains: Young developers

Engr. Bindir, who delivered a keynote on the concept and content of NITTF, said for Nigeria to develop infrastructure for technology advancement and realise its developmental objectives it must retain its first class graduates and challenge them locally, rather than exporting them to foreign countries.

For him, the trend poses great danger to Nigeria’s aspiration to attain her Vision 2020 goals if government fails to halt the trend and change the mentality of the prospective aspirants.

He argued that there is no  way the country can develop its potentials in research results on technology innovations and inventions without engaging its best brains in the local fabrication and development. He noted that the First class brains are usually exploited by their countries of residence for their technology prowess.

“If you don’t put your first class to be challenged in Nigerian soil, you will not develop infrastructure. You will not develop the local taste in terms of research and development and the capacity of even the supervisors cannot be enhanced dynamically. These young people are the highest energy in terms of research. So, we need to keep them through. That is why we made them local.”

The NIITF is an attempt by NOTAP to link the academia to the local industries. The idea is that the industry must learn to contribute in the generation of relevant knowledge for the development of the country.

According to NOTAP, Nigerian industry is very good on the platform of supplying products, goods and services to Nigerians. But to bridge the gap, there I need to have a local content in that bracket.

For the former DG, Nigerians too must stop intellectual property theft and protect it, so that it can actually become asset for them.

“Nigerians too must evolve products made in Nigeria to be of globally acceptable standard, quality and sold at the right price. Is all about knowledge. Nigerians also must learn how to design, establish, operate and manage solid physical infrastructure systems, which is for now  supplied totally by foreign technological companies.”