BY; OLIVIA NNOROM
Obinna Ukachukwu, divisional head for Growth at Sterling Bank has explained that to invest rightly in the education sector, one must ensure that the productivity output of skilled labour coming out of the specific education programme being invested in must exceed the funding input over a period of time.
He said this at a media round table event held in Lagos by Sterling Bank to discuss the topic around creating value that attracts large scale investments in Nigeria’s education sector.
“The moment you begin to underfund a sector that is supposed to drive skill acquisition that impacts economic productivity and development, the outcome of that underfunding will be sub-optimal skill development and as a result, one would create a productivity deficit that will ripple across every other sector.”: Ukachukwu said.
Considering that there has been a rising trend of course creation in the tertiary institutions that does not benefit the country’s economy, Ukachukwu said the future of a community is only guaranteed if the population are trained in courses that lead to specific acquisition of skills that drive productivity geared towards solving real time problems in the community.
He urged that Nigeria should emulate these practical methods from the world’s top economies where education pays for itself.
He emphasised that graduates in these developed economies are hands-on with the development of their economy after their various institutional training, far greater than the institutions that have produced them. The value of their productivity is then reinvested into the educational system.
Speaking on the contributions of Sterling bank to solve the problem of investing for value in Nigeria’s educational sector, Ukachukwu claimed that with the bank’s N15 billion naira loan package, it is arguably has the largest lending portfolio to students in Nigeria, with a novel student proposition and training, that upskills educators to ensure that as many of the needs of the industry are met across board.
According to him,
Sterling Bank has a model that focuses on innovations, partnerships and investment in projects that generate sustainable value in the educated individual. Ukachukwu highlighted its partnership with Decagon Institute of software development, which has produced over 600 market-ready software engineers in less than one year.
He ended the session by saying that Sterling bank’s loan initiatives, beyond getting utmost value from investments, is aimed at bridging the funding gap for students and educators.
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