*NAPEP AND THE CHALLENGES OF TECHNOLOGY FOR RURAL

DEVELOPMENT IN NIGERIA

BY

MUSA ZUBAIRU USMAN

STATE COORDINATOR

NATIONAL POVERTY ERADICATION PROGRAM

(NAPEP)

KADUNA STATE

______________________________________________________________

*Bring text of a contribution to the 3rd Departmental seminar of the Department of Mechanical
Engineering

KADUNA POLYTECHNIC, KADUNA. Held on Thursday 19th November,2009

NAPEP AND THE CHALLENGES OF TECHNOLOGY FOR RURAL DEVELOPMENT

IN NIGERIA
 By

MUSA ZUBAIRU USMAN

STATE COORDINATOR,

NATIONAL POVERTY ERADICATION PROGRAM (NAPEP)

I wish to express our gratitude in NAPEP to the Department of Mechanical Engineering

for proving this opportunity for me to contribute to the Intellectual deliberations on
Technology for rural development at its 3rd Departmental Seminar. Inviting NAPEP to
this important function is a clear indication of the department’s support for the Federal
Government’s efforts towards the Eradication of poverty amongst our people. My
presence here being one of you faced with the National challenge of poverty reduction
in our society is a mark of your Solidarity to the efforts we are making in Kaduna State.

In this presentation therefore, I will attempt to look into the concept of poverty, the
philosophy of NAPEP, inter-play between technology and poverty and the challenges to
appropriate technology for rural development.

THE CONCEPT OF POVERTY:

Poverty is one of the most serious problems confronting Nigerians today. It is generally
associated with conditions under which people live. It is usually defined in either
absolute or relative terms. In absolute term, poverty denotes a condition in which a
person or group of persons who are unable to satisfy their most basic and elementary
requirement of human survival in terms of good nutrition, clothing, shelter, energy,
transport, health, education and recreation.

Since poverty is not only a matter of physical and material deprivation, we must note
that it is such a complex social phenomenon with economic, cultural and socio- political
dimension.

From whichever way one views it, poverty is a dreaded scourge that must be addressed
decisively.

GEOGRAPHICAL AND DEMOGRAPHIC LOCATION OF POVERTY:

There is indeed so much difficulty in establishing the exact geographical distribution of
poverty in Nigeria. But there is that general agreement that poverty is more widespread
in rural areas than in urban areas. Some other related studies attempted to explain
typically that income or expenditure comparisons between rural areas and other urban
cities always show a greater incidence and the depth of poverty in our rural areas.

Within the context of our interaction, it must be understood that a targeted strategy
designed to reduce poverty will vary according to whether poverty is found to be widely
scattered throughout the country or is concentrated in a particular economically
backward, environmentally degraded, isolated or resource-poor places.

THE NAPEP PHILOSOPHY

The philosophy of the National Poverty Eradication Program (NAPEP) provides

strategies for the eradication of absolute poverty in Nigeria. In view of the fact that
poverty in Nigeria is widespread and multidimensional, the Federal Government seeks
to ensure that all activities and program of the Government at all levels and private
sector are coordinated and monitored. In addition, government also seeks to ensure
policy continuity, existence of appropriate institutional framework and sustainability of
the program of government.

TECHNOLOGY FOR RURAL DEVELOPMENT

In our country today our small industries and indeed some major industries use very
obsolete Technology. There are many reasons for this Technological stagnation
which I will mention in the course of our deliberation here today. Most often seminar
of this nature offer researches and come up with solutions. Large numbers of our
industries do not have enough resources at their disposal and may not be able to
use modern Technology as well as install improved equipment and machinery.

Many professional groups and of course the Manufacturers Association of Nigeria

(MAN) in particular need to as a matter of fact belong to the world’s growing
sophistication in order come up with a scheme that will revolutionize our stagnant
Entrepreneurial sector.

We must not lose focus into thinking that modern Technology necessarily means
adopting automation in every case.

Indeed technology development must go hand in hand with the general

improvement in the living standard of the people. Technology must therefore
 complement the philosophy of Poverty Eradication by driving its spirit and
sense of direction from the very society/people it seeks to redeem.

It is crucial at this point to assert that Poverty Eradication being a subject of

immense discourse could achieve its main objective positively using Technology as
its baseline.

Researches available tend to recognize that many strategies used to promote

sustainable patterns of development draw their foundations from Technology. It is
therefore an undeniable fact that new technology and indeed potential future
technologies must hold the prospects for providing a wide range of solutions to the
problems being faced by the poor/rural communities of our Country. Your task in this
seminar is to set the machinery into motion by carrying out researches into:-
identifying and popularizing such Technologies appropriate for rural transformation.

It is therefore imperative for me to briefly take you through some of the ongoing
cardinal Schemes of NAPEP.

1. Village Economic Development Scheme

2. Conditional Cash Transfer Scheme
3. Keke NAPEP

VILLAGE SOLUTIONS

Before the year 2008 NAPEP has been operating under 4 Cardinal Schemes. But as
from 2008 to date the Schemes are consolidated under the scheme tagged Village
Economic Development Solutions (VEDS) or Village Solutions schemes.

The Scheme is a local community driven development program designed by the

Economic Growth and Development Centre (EGDC) and adopted by NAPEP. In the
village Solutions, local villages/communities are guided in the community economic
development efforts that involve modernizing their villages and promoting income
generating activities.

The goal of scheme is Village Economic Transformation and modernization, through

human and physical development to raise village income, output and employment levels
with the aim to eliminate extreme poverty and reduce its intergeneration transfer.

The components of the scheme are Anchor projects, capacity widening activities and
Village trust fund. The first one involves the setting up of cottage industries at the
village. The second has to do with the undertaking of any Economic activities that has
backward or forward linkage with the Anchor project. While the third one takes care of
funding and social infrastructural development of the villages.

Your task at this seminar is to use the local resources to come up with fabricated
machineries that could be used in the implantation of the program to serve as
appropriate Technology for rural Development in Nigeria.

CONDITIONAL CASH TRANSFER (CCT)

Another very important program that needs to be mentioned here is the Conditional
Cash Transfer (CCT).

This is a program which NAPEP provides funds as a grant to the benefitting Households
in the selected LGAs. The Program has some conditions attached to it which are aimed
at improving the human capacity development. The conditions are:

• The benefitting households must provide a trainable person in the family to be

trained certain skill of their own choice.
• The households must allow their children to receive all National Programs on
health.
• The household must allow their school aged children to attend school at least
from primary to junior secondary school levels.

The importance of science and technology to the successful implementation of the

scheme should not be over emphasized. Looking at condition (a) mentioned above,
Science and Technology has an important role to play in providing modern equipment
and raw materials that could be used by the trainable persons at the end of this training.

It is also important to announce that more than five hundred persons have been trained
on skills of their choice from the selected Local Government Areas, in Kaduna State.
Among the trade selected by the persons are:

Barbing and hair dressing,

Tailoring and Fashion design

Carpentry

Computer operation Farming (poultry, aqua, horticulture, etc)

THE KEKE NAPEP PROJECT

Transportation sector is another area that requires the attention of the Government in
reducing the suffering of the people and at the same time improve the socio-economic
activities of the people.

NAPEP as part of its intervention project introduced a program that would assist in
alleviating the transportation problem of the people.

Keke NAPEP is visible in all parts of the country. These tricycle machines have helped
a lot in the transport sector especially in our rural areas. It is a great challenge on our
Technologists to bring more innovation that will improve the machine in terms of speed,
durability etc.

THE INTER-PLAY BETWEEN RURAL DEVELOPMENT, TECHNOLOGY AND

POVERTY ERADICATION

The interactions between poverty and rural development on the one hand and
Technology on the other have always been a topic of lively discussion and debate.
Many researches in this direction have shown the pervasive influence across all sectors
of our economy be it in steel, electronics, food processing, mineral resources, etc.
others have shown that major contributions have also been made by Technology
towards the transformation of our rural communities. It must be noted that technology
has made positive contributions to development programs in our rural settings in the
course of pursuing practical ends; hence abstract principles of science hitherto unknown
are being discovered.

The literature on technology management abounds with numerous definitions of

Technology, each focusing on the specificities relevant to the context in which the term
technology is being used. Some of these researches defined technology with respect to
its generations; others focus on its application and some look at both the application
and generation. This therefore makes the observations of Cetron, (1974) who defined
technology as “the application of knowledge to achieve practical ends” very relevant. In
a similar vein, Schlie et al (1987), viewed Technology as “the knowledge and means of
doing something”. Goilets definition is equally of relevance, he sees technology as the
systematic application of collective human rationality to the solutions of problems by
asserting control over nature... To cap it all, an interesting summary was proffered by
sheriff and his colleagues in the Technology Atlas Project Team, (1988). This team of
experts argued that whether by generation or application, the definition of technology
can be disaggregated in to four totally interlocking embodiment as follows:

1. “Techno ware” this is the object-embodied like the tools, capital goods physical
equipment, machinery etc.
2. “Human Ware”, this simply refers to the aspect of human labor, specialized
ideas, problem solving capacity, capacity for systematic application of
knowledge, understanding etc. in short this is people embodied.
3. “Info ware” is referring to embodiment of documents (document embodied), it
provides knowledge about principles of physical and social phenomena, technical
information, specifications standards, computer software etc.
4. “Orgaware” this is Institution embodied and provides insight into organizational
work assignment, day-to-day operations of production, social arrangements,
organization of products etc.

These four embodiment forms of Technology are complimentary to one another and
required simultaneously for the production of goods and services.

This concept has been successfully demonstrated in Bangladesh and other Asian
countries like South Korea, India, and Japan. Since Technology from the foregoing
does not operate in a vacuum but within an operational environment this seminar
should come up with strategies for such environment where appropriate activities
can easily be carried out for rural development (in my conclusion I will attempt to
proffer some in support to your communiqué).

At this point in our discourse we need to further look into relationship between our
economic reality and Technology as a major aspect of Poverty Eradication which is
entrepreneurial development. This aspect of development and technology require
careful analysis by the seminar.

CHALLENGES TO APPROPRIATE TECHNOLOGY FOR RURAL

DEVELOPMENT IN NIGERIA

Nigeria is a country with numerous business and investment potentials due to the
abundant, vibrant and dynamic human and natural resources it possesses. Although
Nigeria is endowed with these human and natural resources, it is still one of the
frontline countries suffering the negative effect of poverty in the world.

Of the many approaches employed by NAPEP for rural development against poverty
two have so far been endorsed and are fully being implemented. One of the
approaches is concerned with the provision of credit facilities to
small scale industrialist. The aim of this scheme was to give the
Technologists the seed money while the second approach is the
establishment of training facilities for skills acquisition.

Irrespective of the benefits associated with Technology for rural development there
are lots of barriers that have prevented our teeming citizens from fully realizing their
potentials and assuming leadership position in the fight against poverty. These major
barriers are identified under the following:

1. Absence of infrastructural facilities

It is a universal belief that certain basic infrastructural facilities aid the development
of the mind and body and assist productivity in any environment. These facilities
have been identified as good roads, good water supply, and constant power, access
to information and communication technology and other tools of trade.

A case where these are lacking in a country, the growth of the economy will be
adversely affected. In Nigeria, these basic work tools as well as enabling
environment are NOT adequate. This state of affairs has frustrated a lot of or people
with bright ideas and the corresponding spirit to effect change in some areas of our
national life. For instance the power sector has proven the greatest challenge to any
effort towards Technological development. Power is epileptic and most times
businesses have to be run on generators. The cost of alternative source of power
most often erodes whatever profit or capital that has been put aside for the
enterprise/business.

Another factor retarding the development of technology in rural areas is the bad
state of roads in Nigeria and the lack of adequate and alternative means of
transportation. Air transport in Nigeria is expensive and dangerous while rail is
almost nonexistent. Since road is the most affordable means, most people prefer to
travel by road which is often a harrowing experience for many. The transportation
system is unorganized and the dilapidated roads connecting the states and
intractable traffic snarls in the commercial cities are often a nightmare for business.
Thanks to Kaduna state Government for the rebirth of RAILWAYS services.

Telecommunication though available but the enormous cost of the service rendered
by the companies proving the Network of the services is seen as the costliest
anywhere in the world. This cost of course has a domino effect on other services
associated with telecommunications such as the internet.

2. INADEQUATE WORKING CAPITAL

The availability of capital is central to the establishment and continued existence of

any Technological development. It has been observed that for an appropriate
Technological development in our rural areas adequate funds are needed. In a
situation where such is inadequate or unavailable, it becomes a problem. Here like
any other constraint NAPEP has been up to the challenges through its various
Micro-credits programs that attract only 80%. These funds provided by FGN through
NAPEP have remove the notion created that our people particularly the young are
lazy and bereft of technological abilities and ideas. This effort by NAPEP to our
intending Technologist reduces the fall back on personal savings or loans from
family and friends.

3. LOW STANDARD OF EDUCATION

There is no gainsaying the fact that education is the key to the knowledge and that it
pays a strong role in making the burgeoning entrepreneurs. The world today is a
global village and since an intending technologist must be conversant and in tune
with events around and about him, education becomes a critical factor in preparing
and empowering them and qualities required of them. Unfortunately, the role of
education in forming our people to become change agents seems to have been
ignored. Year after year, the quality of education in the Nigerian institutions has
gradually been on the decline. The result is half baked workforce who will be lacking
in personal confidence and desire to look within and make a mark in their selected
area of human endeavor.

TRAINING AND ON THE JOB TRAINING

A regrettable consequence of Technology development amongst our people is the

absence of adequate training in technology that will enable them to meet the
challenges of the future as leaders of businesses and change agents. This is
because our educational institution focuses more on the theories without a
corresponding practical approach.

Technology has been used to improve the quality of life through the use of the
computers and other technological discoveries such as the internet, where the
technologist does not have the knowledge and skill in the latest technology; it will
surely affect their outlook to life. This has resulted in a situation where employers
prefer to take people with job experience and required skills thereby making it
impossible for the young persons to gather the much needed experience, skill,
familiarity with a work environment and basic contacts and network to pioneer a
successful technology project or program. Where some of these basic trainings are
offered, they are usually directed at the employees of big firms considering the
exorbitant fees charged by the institutions or bodies providing same. With little or no
money to spare our technologist often miss these opportunities to equip themselves
mentally to the challenges of business. These also result in low morale, inefficiency
and lack of confidence.

4. ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL AND POLITICAL FACTORS

 Added to the factors listed, there are other major dynamics which play a role in
stifling the dreams and aspirations of our people towards assuming entrepreneur
positions. Economic factors such as policy reversals, high and double taxations,
difficulty in procuring business approvals, high inflation and unstable exchange rates
are some of the areas of concern for success in that Endeavour.

The cost and procedure for establishing a company is rather prohibitive as the
intending entrepreneur in rural technology program must engage the services of a
solicitor and accountant to take care of the legal and financial aspects. Politically,
some of government’s policies are technically designed to favor friends and
associates. The situation is also frustrating and has kept many away from
entrepreneurship towards the transformation of our rural areas through technology
with lots of our youths preferring to be engaged in paid employments where they will
be certain of picking their pay packages at the end of every month without the
worries associated with running a labor intensive business.

CONCLUSION

There is the need for this seminar come up with a program proposal that will
enthrone a regime of technologically developed Rural areas free from poverty,
idleness, lacking in food security, homelessness, sickness etc

REFERENCES:

MILES,D.W.J, |(2008), Appropriate technology for rural development, Intermediate

Technology dev. Group, A.T. Microfiche Reference Library, England

USMAN, M.Z, (2001) , Science and Technology as tools for sustainable poverty
eradication in Nigeria, keynote delivered at the 5th science and technology forum.

USMAN,M.Z., (2007), NAPEP Programs and areas of Collaboration, A paper

presented at workshop organized by the Catholic Archdiocesan committee on
HIV/AID

USMAN, M.Z, (2007), Effective Integration of Poverty Alleviation Strategies into

Local Governments: NAPEP Programs and Challenges, A paper Presented to Local
Government Councils Chairmen in Kaduna State.

USMAN, M.Z. (2009), Developing Entrepreneurial Culture in combating poverty

amongst Nigerians, Lead paper at the Matriculation ceremony of the Federal
Cooperative College, Kaduna.