The Director General, Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON), Mallam Farouk Salim, has disclosed that the agency has initiated moves to increase automation and digitisation of its operations to enhance productivity for effective service delivery.
Salim disclosed this at
the 2023 Strategic Leadership Retreat for Management Staff of the agency
with the theme: “Improving the
Effectiveness and Efficiency of the Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON)
Through Digitalisation.” in Uyo on Tuesday.
He stated that over the years, the organisation had been
making efforts to digitise all processes and procedures in an attempt to make
it a world class standards body.
He said SON had
already strengthened its ICT department as a fulcrum to digitise and automate
its operations.
According to him, Conformity Assessment Programme Scheme,
Mandatory Conformity Assessment Programme, Ports and Borders Processes, Library
Services, Payment System and National Registry for Conformity Assessment
Practitioners have been digitised.
“Digitalisation is a key driver of standardisation and
economic growth in both developed and developing countries across the world.
“Digitalising the public sector operations and services like
our organisation enhances rapid industrialisation which in turn, will create jobs, reduce poverty and
insecurity in our country.
“I have set up a modernisation committee, comprising representatives of relevant
departments which I personally chair to drive our ICT roadmap.
“We are in the process of engaging the services of Webb
Fountain, an ICT Consultant to critically review our infrastructure with a view
to addressing them based on the recommendation of the committee,” Salim said.
He, however, stated that the retreat was to build synergy
amongst management staff, developing roadmap to address challenges of
digitalising the entire organisation, among others.
He urged participants
to actively contribute and provide deep insights into the issues to be
discussed and come up with a roadmap to fully digitise the organisation.
In his remarks, the Director General of National Information
Technology Development Agency (NITDA), Mr Inuwa Kashifu in his keynote
address, commended SON for making the
right move to digitalise the organisation to cutdown clumsiness during
operations.
Kashifu, who was represented by Dr Aristotle Onumo, Acting
Director, Corporate Planning and Strategy, NITDA, said resistance to change to digital ways and
inadequate critical infrastructure like high-speed internet broadband were some
of the setbacks of digitalisation in the country.
He expressed confidence that the new initiative and
collaboration with NITDA would also help the organisation to reduce human
workload, increase transparency, reduce redundancy and increase revenue
generation in SON.
He, however, said
that inadequate trained human resources and inadequate funding to procure
digital equipment and infrastructure were challenges confronting digitisation
operations