Climate Change, N’Delta And The World At Denmark

Being the concluding part of this article fist published on Monday December 7, 2009

Crude Oil Price And National Economy 95 per cent of our foreign exchange earnings comes from crude oil – a commodity we have no influence over the pricing, production quota, and unfortunately also mismanage the revenue accruing to us from it. We have always been victims of the speculative frenzy associated the gyration in crude oil pricing.

Our budget is hinged on price of crude oil. By mid 2008 oil prices were hovering around (US)$150 for a barrel. The talk everywhere for all in the line-up is excess crude account and the sharing formular. The big question is: Why should excess revenue from crude be shared in a country with the poorest power supply, road networks in disrepair, no start-up fund or sources of soft agricultural and industrial loans? Further, how do we make up when revenue from oil falls below the budget benchmark of (US)46 per barrel. Currently, any revenues received above the benchmark budget price is tagged ‘excess crude account’ and it is shared amongst the local, state and federal govemment. Many still consider this practice unhealthy amidst several infrastructural decay.

Technical And Vocational Education

The value of technical and vocational education and training need to be given the attention it deserves because it forms part of the bedrock for the nation’s industrial take off. It is an established fact that universities and tertiary institutions worldwide do not produce trained manpower, rather trainable manpower. With this understanding, both parents, the three tiers of government and organisations must encourage school leavers to undertake additional training (apprenticeship) to acquire specific skills in addition to those taught at school. This prepares them to be employable, entrepreneurial and capable of fitting in, in a wide variety of circumstances. This has been a rewarding trend in developing nations.

 Agriculture

No scientific invention so far has reduced the importance of agriculture. It is generally believed that a nation that cannot feed its citizens remains largely underdeveloped. Interestingly, Nigeria has all the resources to feed her citizens, but with the discovery of oil in the 70s, agriculture was disemphasised resulting in Nigeria being an importer of basic foods including palm oil. The immediate past administration of Olusegun Obasanjo encouraged a retum to the farms by introducing some reforms and incentives including making loans available through the Nigerian Agricultural and Rural Development Bank and a few other designated banks. In the Seven Points Agenda of the Yar Adua administration agriculture also occupies a conspicuous position, and this is commendable. It is also interesting to note that some state govemments have gone ahead to guarantee agricultural loans thereby removing the hurdle posed by inability of farmers to provide security for loans. This is commendable and should be emulated.

The challenge in this sector however is the wide information gap between govemment policies and the benefiting public. Most of these policies are unknown to the public and the farmers. There is also a wide chasm between the researchers and the real farmers. As a result, major discoveries remain as academic papers in the shelves and libraries in our tertiary institutions and other agricultural research institutions. The consequence is that the farmers have sustained the old approaches to planting. They are not motivated to experiment with anything unfamiliar. This challenge can be managed when the community leaders, elected councillors and the researchers work in a synergy.

Attitudinal Change

A major challenge facing Nigerian business community and the public service is the people’s attitude to work. Most Nigerians are entrepreneurial by nature, but this is not manifest in the public service. This is perhaps why the Information Minister is campaigning for REBRANDING NIGERIA. This is still largely misunderstood, we certainly need a change of attitude in the areas of honesty, commitment to work, punctuality, and providing quality service. We must understand that service quality is a distinguishing factor between survival and failure in a service economy.

Conclusion

While we are recipients of negative effects of intemational politics and economic policies, the bulk of our problem is largely internal. That is to say that anyone of us could fail, not necessarily because of the global economic meltdown, rather due to deliberate neglect to understand the chain of unfortunate events and respond quickly.

For our organisations, the bureaucratic model appears hopelessly out of place. According to Peter Drucker: “we are evolving past the monolithic, self perpetuating, steadfastly bureaucratic organisation.” What we need today is a flat, nimble and responsive organisation that can respond to the rapidly changing paradigm, and this demands a radical shift.

In the present pace of change, ignorance can be devastating. It is therefore a necessity that we continuously make conscious efforts to update our knowledge and make informed and appropriate decisions. This is where the Institute of Corporate Administration comes in. With about 50 seminars, in-plants workshops, public lectures, and publications, we have positioned ourselves as providers of ongoing source of high performance training.