Dr. Adeleke Mamora, Minister of Science, Technology and Innovation (STI), says Presidential Executive Order 5 is building up the culture of STI across the board in all engagements.
“It cuts across agriculture, tourism and transportation among others and we are looking at how to make the system more efficient.
“We’re looking at how to also move forward our growth and socio-economic development,” the minister said.
Mamora said that Science and Technology cut across all sectors of the economy, especially now that Nigeria was trying to move to a knowledge economy.
The minister said: ”Executive Order 5 talked about better environment, how to increase efficiency in the system and how to build growth and development.
“The committee is chaired by the president himself, which tells you that this is something that is critical.”
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He said, ”though the level of implementation of the Order is within the ambit of constraints, but we are doing our best.”
Mamora said that one of the constraining factors was funding, which was why they were not relying absolutely on government funding.
According to him,”we are also looking at partnerships, joint ventures, private sector and that at the end of the day, it is all about inclusiveness.”
Mamora said that inclusiveness involved everybody coming together to achieve the goal.
He said, ”women should also be made to play leading roles, with all other components brought in to make STI more exciting.
”We are encouraging all concerned to get involved, we’re exploring all our options, bringing in funders and not leaving anything to chances.”
The minister also said they were exploring the need for collaborations and eliminating duplication of roles.
“When you have funding issue, first thing to be done is to prioritise by identifying superior projects and how to fund them, ” he said .