The Vice Chancellor of the University of Lagos, Prof. Rahamon Bello has disclosed that the only way for Nigeria to recover from its present economic recession was by sustaining appropriate research into economic activities.
He gave this hint recently while declaring open the 11th Unilag Annual Research Conference and Fair with the theme “Diversification in a Developing Economy: Promoting Academia-Industry collaboration” held at the institution’s main campus.
A report from the National Bureau of Statistics, NBS, released early this week indicated that Nigeria’s Gross Domestic Product, GDP, shrunk by 2.24 percent in the third quarter of 2016, pointing out that the depreciation has worsened the country’s chances of getting out of recession in 2016.
But Bello maintained that with Nigeria in recession, there is need to re-engineer the fabrics of nation’s economic activities to ensure a solid and virile base need of the citizenry, especially looking inward into agriculture.
“Nigeria can achieve greatness; if she has a productive economy where the larger chunk of its material needs are produced locally with the attendant optimal use of our agricultural and natural resources.
“The only way to cushion this and sustain it, is through appropriate research into our economic activities, and use of our raw agricultural and natural resources with the aim of establishing novel and viable processes for their uses and applications and by extension export to other users outside of the nation,” he added.
The academic stated that the theme of this year’s conference “Diversification in a Developing Economy: Promoting Academia-Industry collaboration” was most appropriate and in consonance with the mood of the nation, stressing that the Conference sought to bring up avenue for exposure to industrialists and entrepreneurs research results that should be taken advantage of, while industrialists and other economic operators could challenge the researchers and open up collaborations on issues with their operations or businesses.
He asserted that this is the only way Nigerians’ collective efforts can yield fruits to the University, the Industry and the National economic development.
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