Abuja — The Minister of Science and Technology, Grace Ekpiwhre has called for a strict implementation of a Local Content Policy for all major engineering contracts.

Ekpiwhre who made the call in a speech delivered at the Nigerian Economic Summit Group Policy Dialogue on Science and Technology held in Lagos at the weekend said the Ministry would want the government to insist on having clauses in major contracts that would compel firms to source locally their engineering supplies and also locally source an agreed fraction of their engineers in addition to hands-on-training for local operators to eventually take full ownership of the completed project within a specific time limit.

This policy, she explained, was first developed by Japan and had since been utilised by almost all the fast growing Asian countries, while urging Nigeria to leverage on major infrastructural development projects in such sectors as oil, gas, power, transportation and agriculture so as to develop our science and Engineering human capacity and engineering production.

For Science and Technology to play a critical role in the economy, Nigeria must address challenges in the areas of health, food, and energy and also consider global issues like climate change, food scarcity and strategies for achieving the Millennium Development goals (MDG), she added.

In a statement signed by the chief press secretary to the minister, Abdulganiyu Aminu in Abuja to surmount the identified lapses, Ekpiwhre made a case for aggressive training of scientists, engineers and technologists for the up-coming research materials to be creative and internationally competitive to enable the country achieve the vision 20, 2020 objective.

According to her , the current level of investments in science and technology cannot spur the needed transformation of the economy from dependence on crude oil and agriculture to one that is driven by knowledge based value addition.

She attributed the low level of Science and Technology (S&T) development in the country to low budgetary allocations, lack of S&T policy framework for resource mobilization, inadequate and low reward recognition for achievements in S, T & I and low dissemination of scientific information among others.

The minister appealed to the Private Sector to assist in reforming the Science and Technology sector, while calling on the Universities, research institutions and private businesses to cooperate and collaborate in funding need-driven Research and Development programmes for industry.