MINISTRY of Mines and Steel Development, through the Mineral Sector Support for Economic Diversification (MinDiver) Project has commenced a three-day training on Nigerian Minerals Corridor- Decision Support System (NMRDSS) for officials of across different Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs).
This was contained in a press statement made available to Tribune Online in Abuja by the Special Assistant to the minister on Media, Mr Olayinka Oyebode.
According to the statement, the Nigerian Minerals Corridor-Decision Support System came into existence as an economic transformation strategy.
It further described it as a web based decision support system which helps users to analyse mineral resources occurrences and mineral resource corridors.
“Participants at the three-day training were drawn from the Ministry of Mines and Steel Development; Ministry of Works, Power and Housing; Ministry of Environment; Ministry of Transport; as well as Ministry of Trade and Investment and Ministry of budget and Planning.
“Others are Nigeria Bureau of Statistics; National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA); Nigerian Insurance Trust Fund; Office of the Surveyor General of the Federation and the Nigeria Geological Survey Agency (NGSA)”, it added.
In his opening remarks, the Project Coordinator, MinDiver, Mr Linus Adie, urged the participants to be committed to learning all they could in the training, adding that the training was designed towards achieving the transformation objectives of the mineral Sector.
“The training which is being facilitated by highly trained professionals from India, is designed to equip the participants with
hands on experience on the analysis of mineral resource occurrences and mineral resource corridors in Nigeria as practised in other mining nations”, Adie said.
One of the facilitators, Mr. Shafique Ahmed, described the NMRDSS as a key initiative of Government of Nigeria through its Ministry of Mines and Steel Development in the development of Solid mineral sector.
Other facilitators at the training include Mr Shafique Ahmed, an exploration geologist with over a decade or rich experience in handling and interpreting various types of geological and geophysical data for minerals and Oil and Gas industries; Mr Ashutosh Singh and Partha Ghosal, who are Information Systems Experts with close to 20 years experience.
The participant are expected to familiarise themselves with different functionalities of NMRDSS, the existing data types, database structure and application designing approach adopted in the development of NMRDSS and hands-on experience on day today scenarios in decision making.
NMRDSS is developed as a part of “MinDiver” project funded by the World Bank, while RMSI Private Limited from NOIDA, India is the technical consultant to Ministry of Mines and Steel Development in the development of web GIS based application.
The main objectives is to improve the attractiveness of the Nigerian Mining sector as a driver for economic diversification for long-term private sector investment in the exploration and production of minerals and to create a globally competitive sector capable of contributing to wealth creation, providing job opportunities and advancing Nigeria’s social and economic status.
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