Sir, what are the transformational activities that are going on in NASENI and how do they relate to the future of this great establishment?
NASENI has being in existence for about three decades and it is the core of science and technology infrastructure in the country. The Board of NASENI is chaired by the President of which I am the Executive Vice Chairman. We have eleven (11) ministers on our Board, including the Central Bank Governor. This shows you how serious government is towards driving science and engineering infrastructure.
Before I assumed office, there have being lots of research and development (R&D) and prototyping. What this administration is doing differently is to see how we can make these products commercially viable. We believe that there is no point wasting money and resources into research and development if they cannot have any impact on the average Nigerian.
And so far, so good within one year, we’ve been able to bring over 35 market-ready worthy products into the market and we have launched about 44 initiatives from setting up factories and partnering with private sector peers to be able to bring some of these products and initiatives to life such as solar tricycle, electric vehicle, laptop, handset, solar irrigation equipment, etc.
One of the initiatives that we have is the Developing Engineering Leaders through Her (DELT-Her), where we give women opportunity so that they can close the gender gap as far as engineering is concerned in the country. Also, we have the National Asset Restoration Programme where we look at broken down assets that we can bring back to life.
For example, we are doing Tractor Recovery wherein thousands of tractors that are broken down can be repaired rather than buying or importing new tractors. These tractors can be fixed and returned back to the farms to enable farmers to multiply farming cycles. We also have the SheFly Programme which is a drone programme focusing on training female drone pilots. We give them the opportunity to learn and assemble the drones. We have trained them and we have established a centre in the Nigerian Air Force base in Kaduna.
How are you making sure some of these activities will perhaps move Nigeria towards industrialization?
Well, I’m glad you came up with this question because it’s something that I have been looking for the right platform to address it. You know when you are going into industrialization you have to start somewhere. Let’s take a look at what China has achieved. China was accused as the master of copying. Today you can see they are number one in terms of industrialization in the world.
That’s what we need to address as a country. First, you cannot produce 100% which defeats the whole purpose of the organization. And secondly, you have to start somewhere. And when you are starting somewhere you look at where you can leverage your strength. The way we drive it here is different and the way we access it is different and that is called domestication, which is finding the best use of the particular product in your own local terms.
We shouldn’t shy away from the fact that even if you take the product as completely knocked down (CKD), and come and assemble it locally, you are creating jobs for that person that you are sending to even if it is one or two persons. And by doing so, you are giving them access to the inside workings of that product. And that is how you begin to learn. There are companies that all they do is design, they don’t do the production.
Some of the biggest companies in the world do so. For example, Apple just does design of iPhones. The MacBook’s is not produced by Apple. It’s produced by a company in China, but the intellectual property is Apple’s own and Apple perfected the software. We need a mindset shift. Even if we’re importing things, let us start to contribute even if it is from 2% and then we grow it. If you approach it in a manner that you want to do everything 100%, you are not going to be competitive price wise. Quality wise, probably you might not even have the skills to be able to achieve that. The key thing is to start somewhere. It’s a growth that has to go side by side the intellectual capacity of the country as a general and pipeline of skills. It is not something you teach overnight.
Your brilliant idea of creation, collaboration and commercialization (3Cs) concept, how will you rate the output?
So far, the concept has been able to find its way into the rough terrain of science and technology in Nigeria. The Collaboration, Creation and Commercialization is what the 3Cs means. Essentially, we’re willing to collaborate and then create together and then commercialize. It goes back to what I was saying earlier about if a product is not market worthy, then you shouldn’t bother spending money researching, and to just keep them on the shelves. With the collaboration, we are working with private sector. I have N100 million, for example., I will be able to co-fund a project together with a private sector and then do a project that is multiples of that amount of money rather than leaving government to do all of it.
It helps with the risk of the investment because two heads are better than one. If you see a private sector company investing their hard earned money into a project then you know there are high chances of viability. When it comes to commercialization, we all know that government is not the most suited entity with regards to commercializing products. And that’s why we are leveraging on our private sector partners and so far so good, we’ve done those 35 market products. None of them were done solely by NASENI. We won’t have been able to achieve that within a short period of time. Definitely, working together – finding a balance between government and private sector-always brings out success anywhere.
How will NASENI’S commercialization efforts address Nigeria’s energy insufficiency? How are you going to forge ahead in ensuring that the energy sector is driven by NASENI?
Well, NASENI has not allowed investments in renewable energy space to cool. We have our Solar Irrigation Pump, our Solar Home Solutions, our Solar Street Light, and also our solar panels manufactured by our wholly owned company, NASENI Solar Limited (NSEL) in Karshi, FCT Abuja. Also, we are in the process of establishing one of the biggest renewable energy parks in Africa right on Keffi Road, Nasarawa State. It is a 40-hectares Renewable Park.
This is an industrial park dedicated to just producing renewable energy. There’s nothing that we have in abundance like the sun. And now with band ‘A’, I think solar energy has become much more competitive. I strongly believe the future is a renewable energy and there’s no better place than Africa where we have this resources we can harness. Our factories always sell out in terms of products they bring up. We are now moving to 50 megawatts and eventually to 100 megawatts capacity for NSEL because we always have demands for the products.
However, we’re also doing other value additions. For example, we are doing mountain racks. We are in the process of establishing mountain racks factory and what that does is the base where the panel sits apparently about 70% of the cost is something of solar systems. It is something that you can domesticate locally from the assembling of the panels to the mountain racks to transportation. We are really looking closely into that. We are also partnering with Chinese firms for establishment of lithium by traction, which would also compliment the solar efforts to further expand our scope with regards to localization.
