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Nigeria’s development and regulatory body, National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA) is committing to support Aid for Rural Education and Access Initiative (AREAI) as part of the goals of its Strategic Roadmap and Action Plan (SRAP 2021-2024) unveiled weeks back when the agency turned 20.
Director General of NITDA, Mallam Kachifu Inuwa Abdullahi affirmed this commitment to the Chief Executive Director of AREAI, Prince Gideon Olarewaju, and some members of the organisation during a recent courtesy visit to NITDA headquarters in Abuja.
AREAI which focuses on providing access and closing digital gaps in rural areas come within the ambit of NITDA’s commitment to partner non-governmental organisations (NGOs) as captured in the SRAP.
“The SRAP is designed as a template or map to assist the agency achieve the targeted plans through the execution of the strategic pillars,” said Abdullahi.
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He added: “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.”
“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 noted that NITDA is particularly passionate about four focused areas of collaboration including: “Digital literacy and skills, where we have a target of 95% digital literacy in Nigeria by 2030.”
During the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown, NITDA created the virtual academy with an enrolment of over 60, 000 online students and beneficiaries. The agency is now working to upgrading it to a standard mass open online courses platform like Coursera and Edx.
Abdullahi said NITDA believes other “related institutions will key into this and start providing skills and certificate courses for our citizenry and even beyond the shores of our country.”
According to him, the NITDA believes firmly in fostering digital innovation and entrepreneurship, as well as the promotion of local content development which underscored the creation of the National Center for Artificial Intelligence and Robotics.
The NITDA’s boss encouraged 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, digital literacy and skills. He said it is a platform that the agency has adopted to change the Nigerian trajectory through training and skill empowerment.
Olarewaju commended the NITDA for the opportunity to showcase their talent most especially in Digi-learn which is one of the smartest ways of impacting knowledge to the rural communities.
He expressed optimism that the collaboration with NITDA will assist AREAI to bring more innovations into rural communities across Nigeria.
