The Center for Information Technology and Development (CITAD) has said that there is need for Federal government, to come up with a realistic plan, to transform the country from a mere consumer of digital technology, to a digital technology producing country, with capacity and capability for export, of digital goods and services across the world.
This is just as the body noted that the Digital technology has the potential to create jobs, thus addressing the huge unemployment crisis of the country as well as generating wealth to contribute to ending poverty in the country.
The executive director CITAD, Alhaji Yunusa Zakari Ya’u,on Saturday, made the call during a media parley held in Kano adding that there is need for federal government to put modalities in place, to move Nigeria from consumer to producer of technology.
According to him, “Uplifting Nigeria to the position of producing technology driven goods and services, would reduce poverty, unemployment and other societal problems”
Alhaji Yunusa then emphasised on the need, for the minister of communications and digital economy, to set up a Digital Emergency Working Group to study the network readiness index (NRI),with a view to addressing the poor digital situation of the country.
He highlighted; identifying the strategic weaknesses of the country, suggesting solutions,and developing a robust implementation plan, would lift the country out of its present digital stagnation.
He disclosed; “This year Nigeria was ranked 106 out of 134 with a composite score of 35.73, below top African continent performers of Kenya (70), South Africa (74) and Mauritius (76)”
He identified learning from global good practices, provision of loans, grants and subsidy on connectivity to unserved communities, stable power supply, increasing life span of products, renewable technology and removing barriers, as some of the major catalysts to increasing Nigeria’s ranking in the NRI.
He further disclosed; “The design of the NRI, there are four pillars, technology, people, governance and impact.
He however maintained that, the minister needs to find a way to converge a consultative meeting of state governors, to underline the imperative of their being the drivers of the digitisation process of their respective states.
Alhaji Yunusa stressed; “Now is the time to turn that potential into a reality, a task that can only be done by rallying all the sectors of the society together behind a clear national agenda”.
