The National Agency for Science and Engineering Infrastructure (NASENI) has signed a $21.7 million agreement with 11 firms in Nigeria for the take-off of the Delta-2 Projects, the offshoot of the bilateral collaboration between the federal government of Nigeria and the Czech Republic.
The Nigerian firms who are beneficiaries of the project are expected to come up with various products and services to be injected into the Nigerian economy. The Delta-2 Programme is being implemented by the Presidential Implementation Committee on Technology Transfer/Information Exchange (PICTT) of which NASENI is an implementing agency, working in partnership with the Technology Agency of the Czech Republic (TA CR).
The Executive Vice Chairman of NASENI, Khalil Suleiman Halilu, said the Delta 2 programme, which was launched in 2022, was designed with the aim of funding and enabling research, development and innovation projects in Agriculture, Mining, and General Manufacturing for small and medium enterprises (SMEs).
With $21.7 million set aside to finance the selected projects, TA CR will contribute $11.7 million while NASENI will contribute $10 million as a counterpart fund. The bilateral cooperation between Nigeria and the Czech Republic began on 15th May 2014.
Halilu emphasized that the Delta-2 Programme was yet another manifestation of NASENI’s commitment to fulfilling its mandate of transforming Nigeria’s technology and innovation landscape, through sustained focus on its 3Cs principles of Collaboration, Creation and Commercialization.
“Ultimately, our goal is not just to produce prototypes and models, but to ensure that the outcomes of the partnership are taken to market; that they are available commercially for consumers and end-users to benefit from, knowing that the real value of technology lies in market usefulness and application, our vision in the new NASENI that we are building is to create values and to be relevant in the market”.
The EVC/CEO reiterated that for every single kobo that NASENI will invest in this phase of the Delta-2 program, to develop new projects and products, the Agency will realise almost six nairas (N6) in commercial returns, in addition to job creation opportunities, capacity building, and technology transfer.
“That is what NASENI stands for: leveraging technology and talent to deliver returns that benefit Nigeria on multiple levels,”. Halilu said while congratulating the selected beneficiaries of the projects, urged them not to take this massive opportunity for granted as the funds would be deployed with a sense of service and responsibility.
According to the Chairman of the Presidential Implementation Committee (PIC) on Technology Transfer/Information Exchange on Delta 2 Projects, Dahiru Mohammed, he said the program was launched on 18th May 2022 with 285 proposals received from various companies registered in Nigeria. He stated that the evaluation of the proposals was carried out diligently by members of the Assessment Committee who were selected from the Nigerian Academy of Science, Nigerian Academy of Engineering (as research experts) and the Nigeria-Czech Republic Trade and Investment Council (NCTIC).
The process was well coordinated by experts in both fields of research and business and ably assisted by the PIC secretariat. “It is noteworthy that the distribution of the beneficiaries of the awards spans across the country, having all zones represented. “The funds are ready and we eagerly look forward to starting implementation in January 2024. The funding of the projects is scheduled to last between 12 to 36 months,” Dahiru added.
He further said the idea behind the Delta-2 projects was to yield patents, pilot plants, proven technologies, software, certified methodologies, processes and specialised maps, and databases, among others, which is expected that the outcomes of the various projects will have a direct and immediate positive impact on the average Nigerian farmers, miners and MSME operators.
The resulting technologies from these collaborations will be transferred and domesticated in Nigeria through NASENI and other research institutions and private companies.
At the event, separate goodwill messages came from the Minister of Science and Technology, Chief Uche Nnaji; Chairman of Senate Committee on NASENI, Chief Ezenwa Francis Onyewuchi; Chairman, Senate Committee on Science and Technology, Alhaji Aminu Iya Abbas and the Chairman, House Committee on NASENI, Honourable Taofiq A. Abimbola, who reassured the Agency of better enabling laws and collaborating partnership for better productivity.
In a related development, NASENI signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) for a production license for the establishment of coal-based fertilizers in Nigeria with PT Saputra Global Harvest. The agreement with SAPUTRA covers three key areas. Halilu said, “Food Security is one of the priority areas on the Renewed Hope agenda of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu. The President is determined to build a Nigeria that is not only able to feed itself affordably but also one that can produce surplus food for export.”
Others are: the supply of machinery and equipment that will enable us to produce coal-based fertilizer for use in Nigeria; the capacity development component, which is the training of Nigerian personnel on the use and maintenance of this equipment; and licensing that permits Nigeria to produce coal-based fertiliser according to the prevailing standards of quality already established by Saputra. The agreement is building on the initial MoU signed between NASENI and Saputra in September 2022, as part of steps to strengthen the bilateral relationship between Nigeria and Indonesia, while also supporting the development of Nigeria’s agricultural sector.
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