Expert advocates ICT’s restructure

….Wants emphasis on local content
An expert in the Nigerian telecommunications industry has advocated for the restructuring of sector, noting that most of the inputs in the sector are imported from the developed countries with very little value-add exported, which is not really beneficial to the country that is clamouring for local content.

The President of the Association of Telecommunication Companies of Nigeria (ATCON), Mr. Olusola Teniola, made the remarks recently at IT and Telecoms Summit held in Lagos, adding that local content in ICT entails the nation must cautiously devise a means of producing some of those inputs locally and creating more value add and innovations.

“If we really want to pursue Nigerian Local Content Development vigorously as a nation with the intention of increasing its impact on our revenue, we must devise a means of producing some of those inputs locally and creating more value add and innovation on the remaining that we cannot manufacture locally,” Teniola said.

The ATCON president hinted that the liberalization of the sector has attracted about USD$68bn or more of investments to the country to date and urged the Office of the Nigeria Local Content (ONC) under National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA) to create the opportunities

for Nigeria’s ICT to develop solutions tailored to the country’s citizens’ needs, develop the local skills to monetize the youth talent that is latent in producing value-added ICT products and services that can be exported to other parts of Africa and globally.

“The ICT industry is further challenged to reduce or eradicate the continuous unemployment of the Nigerian youth (both skilled and unskilled) as a matter of utmost urgency and there is a need to work out a collaborative agreement with the aim of transferring some of India’s technical know-how to Nigerians

and we pray that all relevant government agencies in Nigeria will support this initiative as it would certainly accelerate as well as give a boost to our local productive capacity,” he added.

He underscored that the Nigeria-India ICT business relationship would foster Nigerian local content through reduction in rate of unemployment; give Nigerians the opportunity to take part in dispensing critical skills and knowledge over the next decades.

He said it would also give Nigerians the opportunity to take part in dispensing critical skills and knowledge over the next decades; less dependency on international currencies as the majority of services rendered would be our local currency (in Naira);

while the success of Local Content drive in the Telecom and ICT in Nigeria would accelerate the progress of the sector.