By JESSICA DOGO

The Minister of Education, Dr. Mauruf Alausa, says the Federal Government has henceforth, cancelled foreign trainings for scholars.

Alausa who said this at the opening ceremony of a three-day conference organised by the British Council on Tuesday in Abuja, said that scholars would now be trained within Nigeria.

The theme of the conference is ?Building Sustainable and Relevant Tertiary Institutions and Systems in Africa.?

The minister said that the Federal Government would be spending substantial money in building simulation lab, as well as building and developing the country?s universities.

?We have just decided to cancel foreign training for scholars. The amount of money we are spending to train one scholar abroad, we could use it to train 20 people here. We will be training everybody here.

?We will unleash capacity in our universities. We are going to be spending more money now on research, innovation, and also on welfare, both on our academics and non-academics,? he said.

The minister said that the Federal Government was poised to use education to empower the youths.

?I have just spoken about the first component of our six-pillar agenda. The second component will be focusing heavily on technical, vocational and educational training,? he said.

He said that young Nigerians would be incentivise to go to technical college and acquire technical knowledge.

?We will pay for their tuition as a second step, and as a third step, a master craft person, when they will get their practical training, we will pay them as well.

?The curriculum will be 80 per cent practical on-the-job training and 20 per cent didactic, and as they are finishing, we will also give them entrepreneurial grants, not loan,? he said.

Speaking on education budget, he said that people only looked at the money on the budget without considering what the government spends on tertiary institutions.

According to him, people just look at what is budgeted to the education ministry, but not really counting the fact that it is also funding federal universities, polytechnics and colleges of education.

Earlier, Dr. Richard Montgomery, the British High Commissioner to Nigeria, said that with the growing African population that might hit 2.5 billion by 2050; Africa needed to build strong and sustainable tertiary institutions.

Montgomery said that such institutions should be able to produce skilled and employable graduates.

?Africa is growing. It has a hugely young population. It is going to be 2.5 billion people by 2050.

?So you need to harness the demographic dividend, and we need to work harder to build institutions that are sustainable and resilient.

?We need to evolve higher education systems, so that they are better able to harness talent, and are better able also to produce graduate skills and knowledge, which aligned to the growing economies,? he said.

According to him, social progress and economic prosperity rely on a healthy tertiary education system.

?The transnational education partnership that we have agreed in Nigeria is creating more linkages between Nigerian higher education institutions and UK universities.

?We hope in time, that it is going to unlock more finance, more expertise, more partnerships between UK institutions and Nigerian institutions.

?In 2022, we had about 750,000 overseas students who came to the UK to study in our higher education institutions, and many of them, tens of thousands of them, come from the African continent,? he said.

Mr Steve Smith, the UK Prime Minister?s International Education Champion, said that the UK?s international education strategy emphasised the importance of education as a tool for social and economic transformation.

Smith said that it sets out the UK government?s ambition to foster strong internationally connected education systems that enabled knowledge sharing, innovation and a welcoming environment for students globally.

?In Africa, this has to include listening to African voices and leaders to develop respectable and equitable UK-Africa partnerships that enhance people-to-people links.

?That will also support research collaborations and align educational goals with the evolving needs of society, all on the basis of mutual respect,? he said. (NAN)

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