The Director General National Research Institute for Chemical Technology (NARICT) Zaria, Professor Jeffrey Barminas has disclosed the Institute’s focus resolve to finding indigenous solutions to the spread of coronavirus pandemic ravaging the world.
Barminas made the submission during NARICT Day with the theme: ‘The Role of Chemical Technology Towards Economic Revival and Sustainability, at the ongoing Science Expo, Thursday in Abuja.
“A key innovative research activity embarked upon by the Institute, focused essentially on how to bring down the spate of coronavirus (COVID-19) infections and provide future integrated research initiative dedicated to the control and prevention of this virus,” he said.
Representative of the Director General (NARICT), Director Finance and Accounting, Alhaji Mohammed Lawal Adamu said in the area of the core mandate of leading the line in overall chemical technology advancement in Nigeria“is the new indigenous capacity to detect, foil or mitigate nuclear, biological and radiological attacks on Nigerian soil at the newly constructed NARICT Nuclear, Biological and Radiological De-Contamination Laboratories. These facilities are also being fitted to treat victims of nuclear, biological and radiological attacks in Nigeria.
“The importance of this breakthrough at NARICT is timely and cannot be overemphasised as overt/covert chemical warfare becomes the global norm rather than the exception. This untoward development poses multidimensional threats to Nigeria’s National Security on a national/transcontinental scale, especially through acts of terrorism, which are increasingly being launched using nuclear, biological and radiological contaminants to deadly effects.”
Permanent Secretary Federal Ministry of Science and Technology Edet Sunday Akpan, represented by Director Chemical Technology Department, Dr. MEJ Bassey said there was need to embrace and develop local capacity and capability for innovations leading to inventive economy thereby proffering solutions to the challenges facing the nation and the world at large.
