TETFUND to spend N10bn on FUTO’s research

FUTO Vice-Chancellor, Prof. Chigozie Asiabaka

The Tertiary Education Trust Fund says it will spend over N10bn on the Research and Technology Park project at the Federal University of Technology, Owerri, Imo State.

The FUTO Vice-Chancellor, Prof. Chigozie Asiabaka, who stated this in an interview with journalists, said TETFund had released the initial N1bn for the park project.

He said, “We are working on a research and technology park; and TETFund has committed the initial N1bn into the project which will cost more than N10bn. A research and technology park basically is where we partner industry, the private sector and then do research for development.

“In a fully developed technology park, you see industry, theory and practice. We do the triple part of it-get research; get it patented; get it commercialised and when we complete the project, it will be an industrial hub because no country can develop without technology and technology park is the key.’’

Asiabaka noted that when completed, the park would have a research and incubator laboratory.

The VC said that the park would also have a researchers’ residence, banks and a helipad.

The 20 TETFund projects in the institution include faculty buildings, lecture theatres, classrooms, hostels and six coaster buses.

Others are the Centre of Entrepreneurship Studies, School of Management Technology complex and School of Engineering complex.