NITDA DG Advocates Knowledge-Based Economy, Probes Nigeria’s Position In Current Tech World

The Director-General of the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA) Mallam Kashifu Abdullahi, calls for a knowledge-based economy.

He said this on Thursday at the 2021 National ICT and Social Media Summit, convened by the National Youth Council of Nigeria (NYCN) held in Abuja, themed, ‘ICT: Use of Social Media for National Integration and Development’.

Abdullahi pointed out advances made in the world of technology, questioning the role of Nigeria in utilising technological resources to drive national growth.

He said, “The world is changing, and it is characterized by how we live in an increasingly capable system. In the history of mankind it is in this time we have systems doing what only humans can do in terms of making decisions and been creative.

“Today we have systems that are more intelligent than us, that can do more than what we can do. So what can we do? Are we to compete with them? Or are we to augment and use them for our own benefits? We talk about social media, which is one of them.

READ ALSO: VAT Collection: Appeal Court Approves Lagos’ Application As Co-respondent

“Today social media is leveraging on our weakest points. social media is driven by algorithm, the algorithm was designed to learn about us, predict what we are going to do and even tell us what to do, that means it is taking advantage of our psychology.

“We need to know how to live with this system. Secondly there are increasingly integrated technology, what we should look at is how to harness these platforms to grow the economy and promote nation building.

“We crafted a strategic roadmap and action plan 2021-2024 and the strategy is anchored on certain strategic pillars. The first is capacity building. When we say capacity building we are talking about digital economy.

“We are talking about knowledge based economy. The youths are our greatest resources in this country, because we have extraordinary people among them. We want them to be creating extraordinary jobs, products and services.”