National Office for Technology Acquisition and Promotion (NOTAP), has saved Nigeria over N80 billion Naira in capital flight, its Director-General, Dr. Dan Azumi Mohammed Ibrahim, has told a group of visiting entrepreneurs.
In addition, the office also got companies like PZ to commit to the provision of laboratories in academic institutions and research institutes for over N400million.
Dr. Ibrahim disclosed this when a group, the Entrepreneurship Tonic, as part of its ongoing national stakeholder’s engagement, paid a working visit to the management NOTAP.
Entrepreneurship Tonic, led by its Convener, Mohammed Basah, is a community of young and aspiring entrepreneurs, created to democratise entrepreneurship capacity development and information dissemination, and create a tribe of job creators finding solutions to key societal challenges.
In a statement, the group said the stakeholders’ engagement tour, which is part of a feedback exchange and partnership forming mechanism for Entrepreneurship Tonic, saw the organization engage with the management of NOTAP.
Speaking at the event, the Convener Mr. Mohammed Basah pointed out that “NOTAP has done a lot to uplift the lot of Nigerian businesses through solid project development and a higher volume of advocacy by the management of the agency”, while going further to state that “Entrepreneurship Tonic is desirous of providing platforms for its members to be able to take advantage of the expertise of NOTAP to ensure that Nigerian entrepreneurs get the best of deals from their foreign partners to further the cause of national development”.
Dr. Ibrahim briefed the visiting team on the mandate of NOTAP and the strides they have made in fulfilling that mandate to the benefit of Nigerian entrepreneurs and increasing the technology pool of Nigeria. Dr. Ibrahim pointed out to his visitors that “NOTAP registers agreements between Nigerian companies and their foreign partners using 3 parameters namely: Economic, Legal & Technical, to ensure that technology transfer and & capacity building components of such deals are protected”.
Dr. Ibrahim also informed his visitors that “NOTAP is working to bridge the gap between local academic research and commercial adoption of research results, as Nigeria has the highest number of research papers in Africa, which aren’t translated into research innovations.”
NOTAP, according to the Director General, is persuading private companies “to adopt technological development as major component of their CSR, rather. This initiative has led to sponsorship of Nigerians by private companies including Airtel, and Nestle among others which has produced PhD holders who have carried out research in Weaning Food for babies transitioning from breastfeeding & another in network security.”