Chief Uche Nnaji, Minister of Innovation, Science, and Technology, has stated that the Federal Government would soon begin regulating and licensing players in the space industry to generate more income.
On Thursday, Nnaji spoke at the opening of the National Space Research and Development Agency’s Advanced Unmanned Aerial Vehicles Laboratory in Abuja.
According to the News Agency of Nigeria, the laboratory’s opening was part of the celebrations for Nigeria’s 25th anniversary in space.
Nnaji remarked that there were several illegalities in the oil and gas industry and other areas of the economy that satellite technology might identify and resolve.
Nnaji said, “Very soon, we will start regulating and licensing the space sector, the upstream, mainstream, and part of downstream, it is a major achievement and it is happening under President Bola Tinubu’s administration.
“With the application of our unmanned aerial vehicles, we are going to use it to monitor pipeline leakages, and pipeline vandalism, and beef up our revenue by monitoring the way ships come into the country.
“When some of these ships come in, they off their ignition and more than 80 percent of ships coming into Nigeria ports don’t pay, they don’t pay bunker fees, they off their ignition.
“We couldn’t monitor some of these things without satellites, but with satellites, we can observe everything and even increase agricultural activity.
“With our satellites, we can monitor earth movements and all these are part of the small benefits of satellite technology.”
In his remarks, NASRDA Director-General Matthew Adepoju stated that the agency deserved to deploy space spin-offs and was actively engaging the private sector to enhance the space ecosystem.
Adepoju remarked, “We have done a lot of research and inventive discoveries, and one of my top goals is to put them into goods and services that can directly help Nigeria’s economy.
