As Nigeria joins the rest of the world to celebrate Internet of things (IoT) day, the National information Technology Development Agency ,NITDA has called on all relevant stakeholders to harness the potentials in IoT to solve the challenges in the country.
A statement by Mrs Hadiza Umar, Head corporate affairs and external relations NITDA says IoT could make it easier for people to work from home during the lockdown.
“The significance of IoT, particular in this trying time of the COVID-19 pandemic, cannot be overemphasised. It is unfortunately experienced in recent times that the COVID-19 outbreak is a global crisis, impacting almost all human endeavours, particularly the health sector. In the heath sector, IoT could be used to fight the virus outbreak and enforcement of lockdowns where necessary in combination with the Geographic Information System (GIS) and other appropriate technologies”.
” Governments all over the world are directing citizens and residence to “Work From Home” as a means of curtailing the spread of the virus. In such a situation, the health sector can promote the use of appropriate IoT solutions and capabilities among doctors and healthcare workers to treat patients via telemedicine. Unfortunately, the pandemic resulted into the loss of my medical doctors and other healthcare workers through physical contact with the infected persons. This therefore means that virtual treatments and interactions can go a long way in safeguarding the precious lives of our healthcare workers”.
NITDA Says it is already harnessing the potentials of Internet of things in the area of Agriculture.
“Adaptation of the IoT architecture is also being used to implement one of the Agency’s key smart-enabled projects in the Agriculture sector tagged “NITDA Adopted Village for Smart Agriculture (NAVSA)”. NAVSA is an ecosystem and data-driven agriculture platform developed to practically accelerate the achievement of Government’s policy objectives in agriculture productivity and food security; food exportation; economic diversification; and jobs creation for sustainable national development”.
” The Agency has also developed an IoT hardware platform in the like of Raspberry pi and Arduino that can support the development of different smart solutions. The UnityBoard version was designed as an embedded AI / IoT STEAM Education Kit and was launched during the 39th edition of the Gulf Information Technology Exhibition (GITEXT), 2019 in Dubai, UAE. It was also presented to the National Council on Communications and Digital Economy (NCCDE) in December 2019 for adoption as training kit to promote technology education at all levels in Nigeria”
They appealed to youth and ICT practitioners to embrace the IoT to develop solutions for the country.
“As we commemorate this all-important day, NITDA is calling on the Nigerian youth and the key practitioners in ICT industry to be prepared to take their rightful places to promote IoT technologies in Nigeria. We are confident that the Nigerian Tech Community has the capacity to harness the potentials of IoT in developing solutions to help in fighting the COVID-19 pandemic “.
The National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA) is a Federal Government Agency under the supervision of the Federal Ministry of Communications and Digital Economy. NITDA was established in April 2001 to implement the Nigerian Information Technology Policy as well as coordinate general IT development and regulation in the country. Specifically, Section 6(a & c) of the Act mandates NITDA to create a framework for the planning, research, development, standardization, application, coordination, monitoring, evaluation and regulation of Information Technology practices, activities and systems in Nigeria; develop guidelines for electronic governance and monitor the use of electronic data interchange and other forms of electronic communication transactions as an alternative to paper-based methods in government, commerce, education, the private and public sectors, labour, and other fields, where the use of electronic communication may improve the exchange of data and information.
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