Babatunde Fashola, Lagos State governor, has urged youths in the state to come forward and access the N1.5 billion Research Fund provided by the government to develop new innovations and solutions.
Fashola who spoke on Thursday at the Main Auditorium, Lagos State University (LASU), to a cross section of students from various tertiary institutions, including those from LASU, Lagos State Polytechnic (LASPOTECH), Lagos State College of Education (LACOED) and Lagos City Polytechnic,said a committee to set guidelines for access of the research fund, has already been inaugurated, while an Innovative Council, headed by Commissioner for Science and Technology, has been set up.
The event was put together to mark his 2,200 days in office.
The governor said the idea was to challenge youths to begin to develop new strategies through adaptive, innovative and creative thinking.
He stressed that current state of the nation warrants that the training methods be re-orientated to retain the critical building blocks, but at the same time become adapted to the real needs of society.
But, he lamented that six months since the year started, no one had come up to apply for the research fund saying that the future development of the country rests in the ability of the present generation to think up home grown ideas and models to solving problems.
“Currently for this year the sum of N1, 500,000 was budgeted and to my knowledge no person has applied for the research fund”.
“The training of our doctors must adapt to what we are seeing today. Public health issues, life style diseases like hypertension, heart and kidney diseases and cases of cancers.
“We must find ways to treat these locally and keep the jobs here.
“Our medicine must now focus also on sports medicine which is a growing area of need and which requires specialisation”.
“We must stop thinking about treating malaria, and start thinking about how to eradicate plasmodium or create a vaccine for it. We have put a research fund there. Please use it”.
On the IPP project, Fashola said the state government is already putting finishing touches to commence the project to service government offices in Ikeja and environs, including the Alausa Secretariat.
He said on completion of that phase, the project will be extended to accommodate tertiary institutions in the state.