By Saheed Ibrahim

The lack of synergy between tertiary institutions and the corporate world has been identified, among other factors, as the major reason for dearth of inventions in Nigerian institutions and dearth of industries in the country.
This position was given by a university, Professor Oluwatosin Fasina and a business administrator, Jomoh Fatoki during an interview with The Hope.
To reverse the trend, the duo wants collaborative efforts between tertiary institutions and private companies.
Fasina, who is the Head of Department, Agricultural Extension and Communication Technology at the Federal University of Technology Akure (FUTA) said the lack of collaboration between the two entities had resulted to lack of investments in most of the inventions in Nigerian schools.
“There are weak linkages or collaboration with industries. For example, in universities, most of the time, researchers, and professors just do their research based on what they feel they want to do.
“There’s actually no synergy with industries. The universities should be able to ask them “What are you looking for? What do you want? What is the problem you have? What can we offer? So, they can request whatever they need from the universities.
“So, the collaboration between industries and universities is very weak. The research is not need-driven.
“We are not actually doing research for what is needed by the industry. Most of the time, we do research because we want to get promoted, write papers because we want to get promotion and then, when we get the promotion, we just put the research somewhere and that is all.
“The industry will not know anything about it because we are all after the promotion and publication”, he revealed.
He also identified lack of acceptability for Nigerian products as a major factor, saying many Nigerians prefer imported goods to locally produced ones.
In his words, “That mindset that foreign things are much better make our people not even trust our own researchers that they can produce something that is worth it or worthwhile.
Prof. Fasina also attributed the dearth of inventions in Nigerian schools to inadequate publicity. He said the actors in the business sector were not usually aware of what is produced in Nigerian universities.
“With the little resources we have, we are doing a lot of things but because of the fact that by the time we bring them out, the foreign issues overshadow whatever we are doing and whatever we are making in Nigeria becomes even more costly than whatever is brought from abroad.
He however recommended that both the universities and the corporate actors should co-operate, saying it is the only way universities can proffer needed solutions to problems identified by the corporate actors.
“The relationship, momentum between the industry and academia needs to be motivated and increased because when there’s a relationship, the researcher will be motivated to do something and won’t want the money to go down the drain and thereby put his best in doing it.
“But when there’s no motivation such that a research is done and there’s no person to pick it up, it gets people discouraged. So, there must be a collaboration from the initial stage between the researcher and the industry so that we can be doing research that is need-driven”, he stated.
He further suggested that government needed to promote locally made goods by placing a ban on the importation of goods.
Also speaking, an expert in Business Administration and Management, Jimoh Fatoki stated that many inventions in Nigerian schools are not what the corporate world needed for their operations, echoing the lack of collaboration between the two parties.
He also averred that many of the inventions by Nigerian schools were not sustainable and scalable, adding that no investor would put his investment in them.
“Most of these things that they say they invented are not sustainable. They are not sustainable in terms of the idea behind them in terms of the reason for putting them.
“For example you invest something that cannot be mass produced. You don’t say because you put all those things together if you want to do it again it becomes a lot difficult. If you want to expand, it becomes a lot difficult.
“So, it is difficult. It is not as if most people don’t want to put money in those things but you know if you want to put money in something, you have to be assured that you get something in return”, he said.
The trained Engineer, who is now a PhD student in Business Administration at the New Mexico University, USA, said as much as engineers think of fabricating tools and machines, business investors are thinking of how they can make money from the things produced.
“So there is no connection between research and industry and that is how we can actually help society if you are in advance country like United States now, organisations come to universities to examine their problems and proffer solutions.
“We must be able to transfer research into industry in other to help the society. Someone should not just think about I want to invest a generator that will be using water.
“That’s good enough but the point is that is it sustainable? Is that the problem that they have in the industry that they want you to solve? That is why there must be connection between the two entities in other to be able to solve problems”, the former Research Assistant at Lagos Business School said.