THE Federal Government of Nigeria and Chinese vendor company Huawei are currently training 20 Nigerian girls on ICT in China as part of the government’s youth empowerment programme.
Also 28,800 unemployed youths nominees across various states of the Federation have so far been trained in online job under the Micro-work and E-lancing) besides the 1000 Girls in ICT in collaboration with Huawei Technologies.
The Minister of Communications, Mr. Adebayo Shittu said in Ile-Ife, Osun State, South West Nigeria that said his ministry is leveraging on Information Communication Technology (ICT) for rejuvenating Nigeria’s economy as well as encouraging massive online job creation through the implementation of various initiatives.
In a in a keynote address he delivered at the opening ceremony of the Ife Youths Economic Summit (IYES 2017), he said the ministry has established incubation hubs in Lagos and Calabar, which are a private and public sector collaboration aimed at catalysing the ICT industry by helping Nigerian ICT entrepreneurs create successful businesses, support the interactions between innovations and their partners and developing indigenous skills and capabilities.
According to him, government is striving to make the ICT sector, the 4th pillar of the nation’s economy in terms of contributions to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP), adding that the sector is the fastest growing and has contributed 9.58 % to the country’s GDP.
Shittu said government plan is to fill the about 24 % IT vacancies in the country, and that the ministry “plans to build technical and job-ready ICT skills to replace expatriate expertise with highly skilled Nigerians, increase the supply of local highly skilled talent to a fast growing sector and enhance ICT industry employment opportunities.”
“So far, Digital Bridge Institute and other tertiary institutions are concluding an agreement with IBM (Skills Development and Research Institutes) to train 25,000 resources in 5 years (2013-2018) per institute.
“Similarly, partnership agreement had been signed with Cisco to build Cisco Academy for highest certification (CCIE: Cisco Certified Internetworking Expert) in Nigeria and with Nokia on MLab Project. The implementation of the Nokia Life programme for farmers is also at an advanced stage.”
By Isaiah Erhiawarien
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