– To inaugurate new chapter in Awka-Owerri
OpeOluwani Akintayo
Lagos — The Nigerian Association of Petroleum Engineers, NAPE has called on the federal government to include digitalisation into the university education curriculum where Geo Sciences are taught in Nigeria.
Dr. James Edet, President of the Association made the call on Wednesday while briefing the media on the outcome of its 2022 University Assistant Programme, UAP held earlier in the month.
According to him, digitalisation is critical to the development of the sector, as this will allow the younger generation to be adequately equipped with technological innovations to drive the energy sector into the next level of development.
“There is a need to bridge the gap between the old and new work force to stimulate energy growth, and this can be done by modifying syllabuses used by professors. We don’t need to change the curriculum because that is the job of the NUC.
“The point is that; digitalisation is very important to steer the industry towards growth and put the academia in the right part or meet the needs of the industry”, he said.
This year’s UAP workshop tagged; ‘Bridging the Industry Academic Gap’, was hinged on actionable points that can be taken by the Association instead of the usual talking points.
He said the lack of a high-quality work force that will be required for Nigeria’s energy transition is a critical and urgent topic of discourse that must be addressed.
The NAPE President added that there should be a collaboration between universities and the industry to draft the course content for Nigeria’s Geo Science education to suite the industry needs, as this would allow students graduate at the degree level industry ready.
He also pushed for NAPE partnership with the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission, NUPRC on research and trainings.
“Nigerian universities need to work closely with the industry to create value on both sides.
“We need to re-engineer industry and university collaboration on researches, resources and to build local capacity for future use.
“We also need to upscale and rescale the syllabus to adapt to the changing business environment in order to stop capital and academic flight from the country.
“As the older generation prepares to retire, there’s need to prepare the young ones for a takeover of the Industry”, he said.
The UAP is NAPE project vehicle arm which supports sponsorships of projects, researches and collaborations in the sector.
Dr. Edet also hinted on the upcoming inauguration of the Awka-Owerri chapter of NAPE.
According to him, the new chapter will enable the Association include the Awka-Owerri axis in its research and mentoring scheme which is tailored towards the specific needs of the industry.
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