Dr Ogbonnaya Onu, the Minister of Science and Technology, says Nigeria is set to domesticate Nanotechnology (the use of electronic devices, catalysts, sensors, others) to enhance the pace of socioeconomic development of the country.
Onu said this while receiving the report of the National Steering Committee on Nanotechnology policy on Tuesday in Abuja.
The minister said that through the technology, Nigeria would achieve much in food security, revamp the health sector, develop space technology, medicine, security and defence and many more aspects of human endeavours.
He said that Nigeria must fully embrace and domesticate Nanotechnology as well as begin further research to enable it to be in a leadership role in terms of modern technologies.
“Nano-technology is so critical in the areas of communication and space technology because many of the advances in these areas would not have been possible without investment in Nanotechnology,” he said.
He emphasised the need for Nigeria to embrace the new technology in view of its rising population.
According to him, in the next 30 years Nigeria can be the third most populous nation in the world while in the next 80 years the country’s population can reach one billion.
“What this means is that we will have more people to feed and more to provide shelter for,” Onu said.
The minister reiterated that this was the reason the Federal Government was striving hard to develop policies that would make the economy knowledge and innovation-driven.
He assured that the technology, as an emerging technology, would revolutionise the manufacturing technology process by making most products lighter, smaller, stronger, cleaner and very precise.
Earlier, Mrs Stella Igwilo, Chairman of the National Steering Committee on Nanotechnology, lauded efforts of the organised private sector, research institutes, universities and relevant MDAs in the development of the policy.
Prof. Sambo Abubakar, former Director-General of Energy Commission of Nigeria and a member of the steering committee, stressed the need for Nigeria to invest massively in emerging technologies to reap in their benefits.
