IKEJA – Gov. Babatunde Fashola of Lagos State on Monday called on reseachers and academics to deploy their expertise towards evolving home-grown solutions to Nigeria `s challenges.
Fashola threw the challenge during the disbursement of grants to 31 beneficiaries whose research proposals had been approved by the state`s Research and Development Council.
The sum of N70 million out of the N142 million approved were disbursed to the beneficiaries by the governor.
The researchers,cutting across various tertiary institutions and disciplines, are expected to proffer solutions to some of the state`s development challenges through their works.
Fashola said local problems were better solved by local people and that a situation where answers always came from other places was not good for the development of the nation.
The governor regretted that local researchers did little in finding a solution to the Ebola problem as most of the drugs being suggested for its containment were from other climes.
“When I see the level of comsumption that we generate from other people`s ideas-Google,Facebook and wrist watches and all sort of things – I ask myself where is the Nigerian idea in all of these.
“And I have challenged the scientists working with me in the council if the books they read are different from the books those producing those great things read.
“If you look at the last epidemic challenge that we faced, all the offers and possible solutions like ZMAPP were coming from outside of Africa where the problem is and there are scientists here who carry all sorts of titles.
“This is the time for academics, the professors and those with doctorate titles to earn their names. It is when our researchers carry out ground-breaking works that we can recognise that they have contributed to the nation `s development,” he said.
Fashola, however, acknowledged that funding had been partly responsible for poor level of innovation in the country, pointing out that the state `s research funds was to help researchers express themselves.
The governor said the successful applicants emerged from seven universities and were expected to produce ground-breaking works in 10 sectors of the state `s economy. [eap_ad_1] He urged beneficiaries not to see the disbursed funds as national cake but to see it as an essential with which to better the lots of the state.
The governor said he understood that not all research efforts would yield the desired results but urged beneficiaries to do all they could to actualise the goals of their work.
Earlier, the Chairman of the state`s Research and Development Council,Prof. Olufemi Bamiro, said the council received 137 proposals from reseachers out of which 78 were shortlisted as fundable.
He said the 78 proposals were further reduced to successful 31 according to the size of the available funds.
Bamiro added that the 31 proposals were approved for funding spread over the thematic areas of agriculture (3), education (3), environment (6), health (8), finance (1), water (1), ICT (1), manufacturing (2), power and energy (3) and media and creative arts (2).
He said the 14 of the beneficiaries were from the University of Lagos, 12 from the Lagos State University, one from Caleb University, one from Pan –Atlantic University and One from Yaba College of Technology.(NAN)
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