NOTAP urged to expand in order to benefit nation

The Senate Committee on Science, Technology and Innovation led by its chairman, Uche Ekwunife, has urged the National Office For Technology Acquisition and Promotion (NOTAP), to establish 6 zonal offices and open liaison offices in states of the federation to help monitor and inspect the technological equipment that are imported into the country.

Ekwunife stated this when she paid a working visit to the Agency and charged the management to focus more on revenue generation for the nation.

She admonished the Agency to harmonise efforts to ensure it translates Research and Development into products and services for the benefit of the country.

Speaking to journalists in an interview, the Director General of NOTAP, Dr. DanAzumi Mohammed Ibrahim, said that the revenue generation earlier was below N300 million, stressing  that he has now moved  it to close to N500 million. He added that with adequate financial provisions the agency can generate more revenue for the country.

He however, noted that the agency is facing the challenge of expectations to improve service delivery while the number of staff every year is decreasing.

“We started automating our process to make sure that we require less number of people to register their technologies.  So, if there is any inquiry on any technology within, few minutes that inquiry will be sent to the person that applied online. So, the automation has reached about 98%.  Now we have increased the revenue generation by over 60%. And by the time we are fully automated I am sure we will hit much more than that.

 “For the last five years, we have been battling to employ staff but we have not been given the financial provisions to do that. The current staff we have is 138 and even in the headquarters we are understaffed. So, going ahead to establish offices with no personnel is going to be challenging,” Ibrahim added.

He said further that the agency is working closely with the National Assembly, through appropriation, “the Senate and House of Representatives Committees on Science Technology and Innovations which are solidly behind the agency could provide the needs of NOTAP.”