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Mr. Daser David, Director General, Plateau State Information Communication and Technology Development Agency (PICTDA), on Thursday said that the Plateau State Government was planning to create a ‘Silicon Plateau’ to reduce youth unemployment. David made this known during the 10th West Africa Convergence Conference (WACC) 2019 which was held in Ikeja.
The theme of the event was “Regulations, Disruptions, Employability, Entrepreneurship, Convergence, Broadband and Broadplan.”
NAN reports that West Africa Convergence Conference is a gathering of stakeholders in Nigeria and West Africa interested in exploring opportunities, building partnership in the ever growing ICT sector as it relates to the dynamics of technology and regulatory convergence.
He said that the state government would establish 17 innovation hubs in the 17 local government areas of Plateau to ensure job creation for the youth. He noted that the Silicon Plateau would serve as a Nexus to supervise all the IT hubs in the state. “Seventy per cent of the youth in Plateau are unemployable and it is a major problem.
“Most of these youths are still waiting for government to provide jobs for them. ” To reduce this issue, the state government is trying to fund the creation of innovation hubs at the local government level to provide opportunities for graduates to train as software developers at the hubs. ”
We want a situation whereby jobs can be outsourced to Jos and not vice versa,” he said.
David noted that once they are trained as software developers, it would be easier to place them in jobs. The director general said that they were already having state meeting with the local government chairmen on the need to invest in the creation of innovation hubs.
He also noted that the state government would definitely partner with private innovation hubs to supervise the affairs of the hubs. David noted that the state was looking forward to have massive software developer talents that would be able to compete across the country and around the world. (NAN).
