Tapping the potentials of technical education

The recent provision of N15 billion by the Federal Government for the rehabilitation of technical laboratories in 51 federal and state polytechnics and N6 billion for the revamping of the nation’s technical colleges brings to fore the need to properly utilise vocational and technical education as a tool for the empowerment of youths with practical skills towards the reduction of high youth unemployment currently at a staggering 50 percent.

We have variously used this medium to urge policymakers in government, especially those concerned with education, human capital development, industrial development, employment and youth development, not to only focus on universities as sources of human resources but to also understand that the foot soldiers and direct purveyors of industrialisation and technological revolution are products of effective vocational and technical education.

Countries that have had remarkable industrial and technological take-off in the last three centuries did so because they had technically-competent people to man the evolving factories, the new technologies applied in the course of industrialisation, the generation and distribution of power, telecommunications, the pervasive information and communication technology and the fabrication of automobiles. The lessons of Japan, China and India are insightful.

With the long neglect of the vocational and technical institutions in the country, their relevance to the realities of our development situation was not felt or understood. It is against this backdrop that we commend the wisdom of the Federal Government and the Federal Ministry of Education in taking the bull by the horn to rejuvenate these centres of technological manpower development.

Analysts strongly hold the view that the huge unemployment among youths in the country draws largely from the pool of school leavers and graduates of tertiary institutions that have essentially acquired academic competence rather than hands-on technical competence.

With the telecommunications revolution already sweeping across Nigeria, and the expected power generation and distribution revolution that would occur with the full take-over of the sector by private operators, a lot of specialised technical hands will be required. Operators in these high-tech areas that have envisioned the demand for these technical hands have either set up training schools or have such plans. These training schools would provide for them places where they could easily mould young ones that would be functional in the new technology economy. This private-sector initiative is coming up vigorously largely because of the long comatose state of our vocational and technical training institutions.

State governments should follow the example of the Federal Government in this area of technical manpower development. The youths should re-orient themselves from the mindset of looking down on technical education and take advantage of the unfolding wind of positive change blowing across the technical education space. The possession of functional technical capacity is a sure guarantee against unemployment in any clime.

On the part of the Federal Government, we caution that this recent re-awakening should not end up as an isolated or flash-in-the-pan action, but should be sustained to become a standard policy practice.

By: BusinessDay