Dr Dan-Azumi Ibrahim, Director-General, National Office for Technology Acquisition and Promotion (NOTAP), has said that the agency had continued to encourage people to use local technology to promote local industries.
Ibrahim, who stated this during an interview with News Agency of Nigeria on Friday in Abuja, said that the agency had also been supporting the growth of local industries by refusing to approve importation of technological services.
“Most times, when Nigerian entrepreneurs enter into a technology transfer agreement with their foreign counterparts, the agreements are drafted in such a way that indigenous technologists/service providers do not benefit.
“Rather, expatriates will be deployed to execute jobs that Nigerian technologists are competent enough to handle.
“Through NOTAP intervention, such agreements are not approved unless redrafted to take care of indigenous technologists/skills,” he said.
The director-general said the intervention was also to stop capital flight, as well as help, improve upon the services that could be rendered by Nigerian technologists.
He said that stopping total reliance on foreign technology would ensure the acceleration of Nigeria’s technological revolution and encourage the growth of local technology.
“Through efficient assimilation and absorption of foreign technology by indigenous technologists, coupled with more concerted effort geared toward the development of indigenous skills, NOTAP has saved the country capital flight that would have gone out of the economy.”
He also revealed that NOTAP evaluated technology transfer agreement in three perspectives, legal, economic and technical perspectives.
“In the legal perspective, the office ensures that the provisions of the agreements are in line with the laws of the land, while the economic perspective ensures that services being rendered are commensurate with the fees paid.
“The technical consideration is to ensure that the agreement has provision for capacity building and knowledge transfer.’’