By Ibiyemi Mathew
The National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA) has pledged support and collaboration to Non-Governmental Organisations(NGOs) working within the scope of the Agency’s Strategic Roadmap and Action Plan (SRAP 2021-2024), and that includes Aid for Rural Education and Access Initiative (AREAI).
Kashifu Abdullahi, DG of NITDA addressing the delegation of AREAI that paid him a couryesy visit at the agency’s headquarters said the agency recently unveiled its Strategic Roadmap and Action Plan, to assist the agency achieve the targeted plans through the execution of the strategic pillars.
According to him, SRAP is anchored on 7 strategic pillars, namely, Developmental Regulations, Digital Literacy and Skills, Digital Transformation, Digital Innovation and Entrepreneurship, Cyber Security, Emerging Technologies, and the seventh pillar is the promotion of Indigenous Content.
He further explained that; with the mandate and expertise from the Aid for Rural Education and Access Initiative, there is an opportunity for Nigerian youth to position itself as a leader in terms of ICT and digital economy and digital literacy with skills and innovation.
Abdullahi added that NITDA is particularly passionate about four mentioned areas of collaborate, these are: Digital literacy and skills, where we have a target of 95% digital literacy in Nigeria by 2030. He said during the lockdown of COVID-19 pandemic, NITDA came up with a virtual academy with an enrolment of over sixty thousand online students and beneficiaries.
The Agency is now working to upgrading it to a standard mass open online courses platform like Coursera and Edx. He said NITDA is hoping that other related institutions will key into this and start providing skills and certificate courses for citizens and even beyond the shores of the country.
Speaking further, Abdullahi said NITDA is already coming up with something new that will impact knowledge to the rural communities. He said the third pillar is Local Content development of which the National Center for Artificial Intelligence and Robotics (NCAIR), one of the centres established by NITDA as an intervention to develop local content and upgrade the skills of Nigerian citizenry.
He encouraged the AREAI to take advantage of this facility to identify talents and develop ideas in their areas of interest that will impact on the girl-child education’s digital literacy and skills, because it is a platform NITDA has adopted to change the Nigerian trajectory through training and skill empowerment.