The Director-General of the National Office for Technology Acquisition and Promotion (NOTAP), Dan-Azumi Ibrahim, said the incidences of capital flights through technology have been reduced drastically.
He said the agency was able to achieve this through its refusal to approve the importation of technological services that could be rendered by Nigerian technologists.
Speaking during an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), Ibrahim said most Nigerian entrepreneurs have the habit of giving contracts that could be executed by Nigerians to foreigners, which has been leading to capital flights. He said the agency.
Highlighting various interventions of the agency in combating capital flights, Ibrahim said:
- “Most times, when Nigerian entrepreneurs enter into a technology transfer agreement with their foreign counterparts, the agreements are drafted in such a way that Nigerian contractors, technologists, and service providers do not benefit.
- “Rather, expatriates will be deployed to execute jobs that Nigerian technologists are competent enough to handle.
- “Through NOTAP’s interventions, such agreements are not approved unless they are redrafted to take care of indigenous technologists and skills.”
Ibrahim said these measures were adopted to ensure the acceleration of Nigeria’s technological revolution by encouraging local technology and stopping capital flight.
He added that for NOTAP to bridge the gap between academia and the industry, it had established over 60 Intellectual Property and Technology Transfer Offices (IPTTOs) across the nation’s tertiary educational institutions.
- According to him, by establishing IPTTOs across Nigeria’s knowledge institutions, NOTAP had saved Nigeria a lot of billions of Naira in the last 10 years in capital flight,’’ the D-G said.
- Ibrahim said that one of the missions of NOTAP was to promote qualitative original research through sensitisation and foster strong collaborations between universities and industries through the establishment of IPTTO.
- He added that the establishment of IPTTOs was aimed at providing patents registration, promoting robust patent policy, and driving the commercialisation of products of patents and innovations for sound economic rewards.
