The State Government in North Central Nigeria is taking advantage of the myriad potentials of its youth population using ICT skills to create a silicon valley that will incubate about 5000 start-ups from across the 17 local governments in the state.
The Silicon Valley, which is intended to reduce youth unemployment in the state, would serve as a Nexus to supervise all the IT hubs in the state and export IT skills to other parts of the country.
Speaking with a select technology journalist in Lagos, South West, Nigeria, the Director General of the Information and Communication Technology Development Agency, Mr. Daser David said that state government would establish 17 innovation hubs in the 17 local government areas of Plateau to ensure job creation for the youth.
David was a keynote speaker at the 10th West Africa Convergence Conference (WACC) 2019 told journalist that impact of technology cannot be over-emphasised especially in the area of job creation and preparing the Plateau youths for global competitiveness.
He said that the 5,000 start-ups will enable escalate the injection more funds into the state economy and bolster it as a hub for the North Central region of the country adding that innovation hubs at the local government level would provide opportunities for graduates to train as software developers at the hubs.
According to him, the state government is hopeful that jobs can be outsourced to start-ups in the state noting that talks are on with the local government chairmen on the need to invest in the creation of innovation hubs.
He also said that the state government would partner with private innovation hubs to supervise the affairs of the hubs and expressed confidence that massive software developer talents that would be able to compete across the country and around the world would emerge from the hubs.
David, who had extensive experience in hub management having led the foundation of N-Hub, said talents are abound in the state and the Information and Communication Technology Development Agency, which is under the office of the governor, Mr. Simon Lalong, said that promised to use technology to boost the economy of the state with support of the governor.
He added that agency would initiate partnership with both local and international technology organisation saying that they are already working with the likes of Facebook and Google.
Isaiah Erhiawarien
