Follow Us on Google
From Geoffrey Anyanwu, Enugu
As part of its contribution to tackling the unemployment menace in the country, the Federal Institute of Industrial Research Oshodi (FIIRO) has trained over 80 youths and women in Enugu State on Fruit Juice Production technology.
The Institute has also reiterated its readiness for the transfer of its over 250 developed indigenous technologies to fight youth unemployment presently ravaging most nations of the world including Nigeria.
The Acting Director General/Chief Executive Officer of the institution, Dr Yemisi Asagbra, who spoke in Enugu at the opening ceremony of Techno-Entrepreneurship Awareness Creation and Demonstration Training (FIIRO Developed Technology) on Fruit Juice for wealth creation and food scarcity in the South East geopolitical zone, said entrepreneurship has been acknowledged all over the world as the surest way for massive job creation.
She said the best way to go now was to encourage the youths and women to develop entrepreneurial culture, disclosing that FIIRO had commenced a process that would lead to massive creation of employment in Nigeria in the nearest future.
Asagbra whose address was read by the Zonal Coordinator, South East, Tony Agalaba noted that the institute in the realization of its mandated had worked virtually on all agro-commodities in the country has developed over 250 indigenous technologies just as it has since the inception of its technology transfer programme in 1986 and other entrepreneurship development programmes trained over 500,000 techno-entrepreneurs.
She said: ‘I am, therefore, pleased to inform you that the institute is working assiduously, deploying its technologies to assist in rural industrialization using raw materials of relative advantage in each geopolitical zone in Nigeria.
‘The overall objective of the institute’s training programme is to address the critical issue of youths and women unemployment by exposing them to various technology-based entrepreneurial opportunities that are available for economic empowerment to give them the opportunities to be their own bosses through enterprise creation and development; in particular, this training programme is on Fruit Juice Production technology to control post-harvest losses and encourage backward integration through value addition.
‘FIIRO is mandated to transfer its technology and being FIIRO trainee puts you in good stead to go into discussions with other government agencies who can aid businesses such as Bank of Industries, National Food and Drug Law Enforcement Agency and so on.’
Some of the participants who spoke thanked the government for the training but lamented that it was their first time hearing about FIIRO and urged Institute to make their presence felt in the state and the entire South East.
