The Director-General of the National Office for Technology Acquisition and Promotion (NOTAP), Dr Umar Bindir, says in Abuja that the N2.5 billion allocated to science and technology in the 2013 budget is paltry.

The director-general told our correspondent  that universally, countries that desired to move forward aggressively invested between 1 per cent and 5 per cent of their GDP to scientific research.

He said that science, technology and innovation to economy development is very important, stressing that allocation to science and technology in the budget is grossly inadequate.

He said: “the budgetary allocation to science and technology in the 2013 budget is not adequate. It is not. If you want the literal answer, it’s just not.’’

“Generically if you look at countries that have arrogantly or deliberately displayed their intention to move forward, the investment in scientific research and development ranges between1 per cent to 5 per cent of their GDP.

“And we are talking of countries that have got trillions of dollars-based GDP.

“Our country, the mode with which we are looking at this is like government has to invest a reasonable amount of money for research and development.

“But that is not necessarily true for the other countries. What we have seen is the collective responsibilities of government working with industry, collective responsibility of individuals and corporate organisations, all understanding that research is important.

“You have to invest to generate knowledge that is superior. It is the knowledge that you try to embody to produce money through technology and innovation.’’

Bindir said that it was unfortunate that it was only the government that was investing in research and development in Nigeria, unlike what obtained in other countries where it was the collective responsibility of government, industries, and other corporate organisations.

He said that Nigeria had to invest now to generate knowledge that was superior and could generate revenue through technology and innovation.

Bindir observed that while Ahmadu Bello University Zaria, Kaduna State, and Harvard University in the United States of America were both universities, the differed gravely in terms of funding.

“These are two universities; they are actually similar; they have names, they have buildings; they have students, they have professors and teachers, they have laboratories and so on.

“But when you come to the issue of funding, you’ll find that Harvard University is generating something in the region of billions of dollars coming back to it based on the usage of its knowledge, whereas Ahmadu Bello University is not getting that, it’s waiting for government budget.

“So this is the issue of intellectual property generation again; this is the issue of embodying the intellectual property to become a component in making people to work, to generate SMEs, to employ people.’’

Bindir also told NAN that intellectual properties had to become the main ingredient in generating small and medium businesses and generating revenue for funding of scientific innovations in Nigerian universities.

He said that to achieve such, universities must attach great importance to the issue of patenting intellectual materials that could be deployed to meet the needs of local industries.

He stressed that the difference between developing countries and developed countries literally was based on the maturity of generating and deploying intellectual properties.

He said: “this is the difference; any country that does not understand this would probably continue to lag behind.

“The culture is very weak in Nigeria and therefore our agency that has been mandated by law to regulate the consumption of foreign intellectual materials in Nigeria realises that Nigeria is literally nearly a 100 per cent in consuming mode for technology-based intellectuals.

“Our observation is that the generic generating process of all intellectual property including patents, trademarks, industrial designs, franchises, are trade secrets.”