Science & Tech
A group,Young Innovators of Nigeria (YIN) has commended President Muhammadu Buhari for assenting to the Nigeria Startup Act.
The group also said that the Act would solidify development in the technology ecosystem.
The President of YIN,Mr Andrew Abu, said this on Friday while reacting to the approval of the Bill by Buhari on Wednesday in Abuja.
“Primarily, this Act will solidify our innovation ecosystem by serving as a launchpad for startups to take more innovative steps in developing solutions that can address our challenges.
“The Act will further strengthen the support to innovation hubs and accelerators to be the driving house for the development of the much needed skills and human capital development the start-ups will need to have to thrive.
“It encompasses regulation of tax and fiscal incentives’ support to the start-ups from ideation to market stage,” he said.
Abu highlighted that the Act made provision for an enabling environment for the development and operation of start-ups.
According to him,creating an enabling environment will enable them to compete globally.
“This will further foster the development of technology enabled talents to think deeply and reposition the Nigeria start-up ecosystem as a leading digital technology hub because of the quality of solutions that will be globally competitive.
“That will also set the country’s start-up ecosystem as one of the drivers to achieve the African Continental Free Trade Area(AfCFTA) goals if we get the implementation right.
“The Act, when the implementation begins, can create more than 10,000 direct jobs within the first few months,” Abu said.
He,however,raised concerns that seed funding and access to capital remained a huge challenge to start-ups but the Act addressed that.
Abu said: “The Act stated an initial N10 billion endowment fund for seed funding.
“I see the Federal Government taking direct steps to work with this very important sector.
“The sector has the capacity to lift millions out of poverty within a short time as technology entrepreneurs do everywhere.”
Abu added that being part of the bill process and having an established Act meant the Federal Government worked with the stakeholders.
The president commended Prof. Isa Pantami, Minister of Communications and Digital Economy,National Information Technology Development Agency,YIN and other relevant stakeholders that pushed for the establishment of the Act.
He added that the era of Pantami had witnessed many wins for the communications and start-up ecosystems due to policies to address challenges within the digital economy space.
Abu said YIN had put in much work since 2013 to see that the Act came to light,hence willing to collaborate with the government in the implementation of the Act.
The Nigeria Startup Bill project was a joint initiative by Nigeria’s tech. startup ecosystem and the Presidency to harness the potential of digital economy through co-created regulations.(NAN)
A.I
Tags: Nigeria Startup Act. President Muhammadu Buhari Young Innovators of Nigeria
