The National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA) on Thursday resolved to partner Independence Digital, a Russian software company, to boost indigenous content production.

The partnership was part of the efforts by the agency to implement the promotion of indigenous content which was one of the pillars of its Strategic Roadmap and Action Plan (SRAP 2021-2024).

The resolution was reached when the DG of NITDA, Kashifu Inuwa, represented by Dr. Usman Gambo, Director of IT Infrastructure Solutions, in the agency received a delegation of the Russian group.

Inuwa explained that the Federal Government had in 2019 established the Nigerian Digital Economy Policy and Strategy (NDEPS), a 10-year policy plan, to digitally transform the country.

According to him, establishment of the NDEPS include software development.

“It was necessary to come up with policies and regulatory instruments which will help develop the sector in many ways.

“Since we are talking about software development, we need to come up with software related policies, standards and frameworks that will meet up with international standards,” he said.

He added that Indigenous Content Development and Promotion remained a primary focus of the agency which had necessitated the collaboration.

“As Russia doesn’t use solutions developed outside Russia, we in Nigeria would love to collaborate with you so that you can help us achieve this.”

Inuwa further assured the company of the agency’s willingness to share other open documents such as the Cloud Computing Policy and the National Broadband Implementation Plan with SRAP as the primary focus.

He added that regulation was not to stifle innovations, rather it was necessary to co-create and work with developers who would understand the needs, create regulatory instruments as well as frameworks that would support existing regulations.

Mr. Paul Maximeak, a representative of the Independence Digital, earlier appreciated NITDA and assured the agency of collaboration in areas of capacity building to improve existing infrastructures already built.

Maximeak stated that the organisation, a certified partner of most major Russian software developers such as the Kaspersky Lab, eXpress, Infowatch, Security Code and others, was excited to collaborate with NITDA on software development.

“We will provide solutions to your challenges and arrange for our engineers to meet with yours in building a supportive framework,” he said.