NASS, experts charge youths on AI, digital economy

The House of Representatives Committee Chairman on Digital, Information Communication Technology and Cyber-security, Adedeji Dhikrullahi Olajide, and digital experts and convener of Ibadan Tech-Expo 2024, Danjuma Balogun, said data, digital and artificial intelligence is the next oil, calling on the youths to embrace technological and innovation knowledge.

They made the call during the Ibadan Tech Expo 2024, which was held at the International Conference Centre (ICC), University of Ibadan (UI), Oyo state.
The programme, which was supported by the Oyo State Government and Beulah Adeoye Foundation, attracted thousands of youths, digital companies and other stakeholders in the digital world.

The lawmaker said: “The whole world now is automation.  Automation is the word now.  Data is driving almost everything, all areas of our lives. If you look at food technology, it’s all about data. Health technology is all about data. You cannot do anything today without ICT. If you take your phone now and go on Facebook, you’re on technology. What are you doing? You’re generating data or you’re retrieving data. Data is growing exponentially.
 
“So, it is all about the digital world. Nigeria right now, we are going to position Nigeria to move to the next generation of technology. We are not going to worry about all the things we have missed in the past. We’re going to worry about where we are going to take Nigeria. I am very confident that Nigeria is going to get there.
  
“One thing we have identified in almost every technology that you have today, there are risk factors and you also have to mitigate those risks. So once you identify the risk, you have to come up with a legislative framework that will allow you to mitigate that risk. So if it’s all about data, you have to tell people, give them the data structure of how they are going to be interacting with data.”

On his part, Balogun said: “We are trying to bring everybody together. You can see so many tech companies here. It all started in Ibadan. So basically, it’s just like our own expo for them so that everybody can come together. We can meet, network, mingle together, learn new things, and also collaborate. So that’s the major reason why we started the Ibadan Tech Expo.”