Israeli-backed I-FAIR Initiative Urges More Investment On Nigerian Youths

Nigerian and Israeli Mentors of the Innovative Fellowship for Aspiring Inventors and Researchers (i-FAIR-2), have charged the Federal government  and major stakeholders in science technology and innovation to increase investment in innovation and research among the youth to tackle poverty.

The mentors made this call during an interaction with  journalists on the “Heart of Prototype” development processes in transforming ideas into inventions  at the ongoing  i-FAIR-2 Innovation Centre in Abuja.

Agu Collins Agu, who is a Mentor at i-FAIR-2 programme,   said the initiative which  started in December, 2021, focuses on using “innovation to develop local content”. He also called on the government to address the challenge of enabling environment, which “will motivate more industry experts to deepen their technical processes of building inventions.”

Collins, also a director at the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA), commended the determination of the Federal Government and Israel to promote innovation through the establishment of i-FAIR Centre.

Also speaking during the event an Israeli Mentor of i-FAIR practical MakeLAb, Saron Paz,  emphasized the need to promote innovative education among the youth starting from the kindergarten.

The mentor said if the youth  get their education right, they can become more creative and add value  to what is already existing.

Paz said “today you do not have to have a lot of money as capital to embark on a project and create prototypes; you can come here if you are 16 years of age, 12 years old or even 10 years old.

“You need to have the right mindset, you need to be creative, you need to be engaging and focused, a lot of things are not related to knowledge, but good mindset.”

Contributing, the Communications Advisor of i-FAIRS,  Deji Ige, said that Nigeria can only make meaningful progress if it  makes innovation and creativity priorities.

“ I-FAIR is creating a culture of innovation and invention in Nigerians to  transform their ideas into products for the African and global markets” he said.He added  that this will come  from a “very functional and dynamic ecosystem of innovations, inventions and startups in the country.”

The I-FAIR-2 programme is an initiative of the Israel Embassy in Nigeria, in collaboration with the Office of the Vice President and Skill G Ltd., Gregory University and DeNovo, private sector-based organisations.