The Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFund) says it has spent over N23 billion on funding research across the country.
Assistant Director, Research and Development (R&D) of TETFund, Dr. Hadiza Ismail, made this known at a validation workshop on “Strengthening Research and Innovation Funding Agencies in West Africa, which was held at the Fund’s headquarters in Abuja.
Hadiza, who represented the Director of TETFund’s R&D at the event, said the agency was fully committed to the establishment of a Science Granting Council in Nigeria.
For the Executive Director, African Technology Policy Studies (ATPS) Network, Professor Nicholas Ozor, the workshop was aimed at giving momentum to a project designed to strengthen national research councils in six West African countries.
In his remarks, the President of African University of Science and Technology (AUST), Abuja, Professor Peter Onwualu who harped on the importance of innovation in bringing about development, said the workshop was expected to usher in a functional science granting council in Nigeria.
The functional science granting council will be expected to finance and fund research in all sectors of the economy, universities, polytechnics, research institutes, private sector organizations, SMEs, and even the informal sector.
