On November 15th 2023, the Honourable Minister of
Communications, Innovation and Digital Economy, Dr Bosun Tijani and his team
kicked off the first cohort of the 3MTT programme during a live session.
Read the video transcript below and scroll down to the bottom of the page to watch the live stream.
"If you follow the development in the technology ecosystem globally, you will see the LinkedIn, for instance, projected that in 2001 there were just about 5.5 million tech jobs in the world, in the whole world. So the workforce for technology in the world in year 2001 was just 5.5 million people.
By this year, 2023, the workforce for technology has gone up to 85.64 million people globally, 85.64 million people.
Though a significant portion of that is still very skewed when you look at the gender balance, where women in 2026 were just 26% of the total technology workforce globally.
By 2020, that moved to 26%. This same workforce is now being projected to grow by 2028 by 35%. So there's a 25% growth that is expected by the year 2028.
And some of the growth, as you can see on the screen in terms of the projection, 2001, like I said earlier, it was 5.5 million. 2023 was 85.64 million.
By 2028, in terms of the number, we're expecting that there will be 115.4 million people working within the technology ecosystem globally.
And you can see the breakdown. For those of you who have been paying attention and particularly interested in being part of this ecosystem, perhaps becoming a contributor to it, you know, finding decent jobs, whether it's in Nigeria or all over the world, you also have a breakdown is expected as software developers and engineers.
By this year, we have about 24.2 million of them globally. By 2028, it is projected that there will be 33.4 million software developers globally.
Information security analysts is expected to grow from 4.2 million to 6.4, 6.6 million. And if you look at the numbers that we're projecting, web developers will move from 2.3 million people working in the tech ecosystem to 3.7 million people. Database administrators will move from 1.2 in 2023 to 1.8 in 2028. And you can see the numbers there. Information technology and system managers will move from 0.8 to 1.2 million.
This is the projection that we're expecting to see globally, you know, by 2028. But the reality is that despite the size of this workforce, and we live in a world where so many people are still unemployed, there's about 4.5 million unfilled tech jobs globally at the minute.
As of this year, there's a massive gap in demand for tech talent and actually the supply and availability of tech talent globally. And you can see the breakdown in software development that's got for about 1 million people. And these are well-paying jobs.
If you follow the story of individuals, boats within Nigeria and outside that decided to take part and be part of the ecosystem, those who work for companies within the technology space are some of the well-paid individuals globally.
So there's about 1 million software development job at the minute that is currently unfulfilled. Cloud computing, for instance, there's 1.5 million unfilled jobs.
Cybersecurity currently has about 1.8 million unfilled jobs. And artificial intelligence, which is becoming a major major phenomenon, has about 2.2 million unfilled positions.
Where does this take us? There is a significant opportunity for Nigeria to actually become a major source of workforce for the technology ecosystem.
Not only for us to be able to export, but because as we continue to grow and accomplish our objectives, particularly the objectives of diversifying our economy, are set out by our President, we expect that even locally there's going to be significant shortage.
But as we prepare for this shortage, as technology become a major part of our economy and society, we must also take
advantage of the fact that our population is significantly young. 60 percent of the Nigerian
population are young people under the age of 25, which means we have a unique opportunity,
not only to groom a strong workforce locally, but to also become a net exporter of technology
talent to the rest of the world. If you follow development again in places like Europe,
where most European countries are seeing aging population, but also at the same time their
population is declining. So they're going to look to countries like Nigeria for supply of technical
talents that can help to continue to drive the application of technology. And it is our belief
based on data that has been projected by LinkedIn that Nigeria can actually feel about 22 percent
of the current global shortage in technology talents globally. And we believe that the opportunity
that exists for us gives us the chance to be able to participate in global financial technology
ecosystem. We can't contribute 0.15 million people to that ecosystem. Same for data science,
which is growing significantly tends to add artificial intelligence, but also 0.2 million to
information security, which is going to become extremely important as technology continues to
permeate every aspect of our society and life. And most importantly, because technology is also
driven by software, Nigeria alone can contribute 0.5 million people to the shortage that we currently
have in the software development workforce globally. And this is why our ministry,
but also within this government, we've decided to project Nigeria as a technician that it has become
in the last 10 years, but to also invest significantly in driving the agenda and ensuring that we can
put programs in place that can leverage our strengths and resources to drive us to becoming
the tech nation that we actually would like to be. By becoming the tech nation, we can continue
to diversify our economy, strengthen the complexity of our economy and ensure that we continue to grow.
And as we continue to grow, we can create job opportunities for our theming youth, thereby
ensuring that it can contribute to economic development in our nation. You've seen in the last
probably less than 100 days, we've launched so many programs, including the 3MTT, which we're
kicking off today. And so what is 3MTT? 3MTT is simply building on everything I've said so far
to build the workforce of the future, not only for Nigeria, but the world. Nigeria is known to be a
major supplier of tech talent. We are known to be a major supplier of talents generally, but we want
to cement that position and ensure that our young people, but also middle-aged people can
actually benefit from the opportunity that this has to offer. This is why we've set an ambitious
target for ourselves to train 3MTT all across the country. You can't be rest assured that this
is a program that is being managed without any bias. Everyone that's applied to be part of this
program, as long as you're part of those 3MTT that gets to apply, will get the opportunity to be
trained. What you're going to see, however, is that for us to judiciously manage this process,
we will break this down using a novel approach that we've created just to ensure that this is
not just a program that says we want to train and we just train. Without ensuring that the people
that are being trained actually get quality education out of it, without ensuring that the
people that are being trained actually can find jobs. So we've developed a system to help us
learn as we roll out this program to help us ensure that we're using our budget judiciously,
and that approach is what we call the 1 to 10 to 100. The idea behind the 1 to 10 to 100,
which is a methodology that we're applying to all the programs we're running in the ministry,
is that whatever we set out to do, we start by testing out and prototyping with 1%. 1% in this case
speaks to 30,000 people of the 3MTT. And this is what we're going to be doing in the first three
months. So we will focus on the first batch of people. So if by any means you're not part of the
first 1%, this does not imply that you're not going to benefit from this program. But the first set of
people that will benefit from the program for the next three months with the initial 1%. By
deploying this 1%, we hope to learn significantly in terms of what we should be doing to improve
the program, what we should be doing to ensure that the people that we're training are actually
getting the required skill set that can make them employable. But also what we should be doing to
ensure that employers actually trust this program and can recruit from this program. So that's what
we're going to do with the 1%. And that lesson is what we're then going to take into the second batch,
which will start in February next year. And that's going to take us to 10%, which is where we're going
to focus on training 300,000 people. This 300,000 people again will be selected based on clusters
from all over the country, all the Tennessee state, including the federal capital territory,
will benefit from this. So as we launch this in February, we will learn, and this is what we call
the pilots. This is the real pilot. We will learn the necessary things that we must take into
consideration to be able to scale this program to 3 million. And once we do that for another
3 to 6 to 9 months, we will then go all out to deploy and aim to achieve our target of 3 million.
I'd like to state once again, the motive behind this program is our understanding of the opportunity
that exists locally and across the globe for our young people to truly participate in the global
economy. The opportunities are there, as you can see from the statistics I've shared. It is our
responsibility as government to empower you to ensure that you have the foundation that can give
you the opportunity to be part of the global economy. And that's what this program is about.
I'd like to iterate that this is not a program that is going to be sharing laptops. We've had so
many stories. We won't share laptops. But one thing you can ensure that we'll do is we will work with
partners that will make it possible for you to be able to get loans to acquire your laptop as
when needed. In terms of how we're going to deploy the program, my colleague will come
shortly to talk you through the practical details. But we are working with partners from across
the country that can also provide their facility. A lot of these facilities will come with computers
and internet access. And you'll be able to leverage this facility to learn as you go.
As you continue to learn, our program will bring opportunities to you for internships,
where some of you guys can start to apply the skillset that you've acquired so that you can
polish up and ensure that you actually have a good understanding in the career parts that you've
chosen. In addition to that, our partners will also run clusters across the country where you will
get the chance to be with other people like yourself that are learning that are part of the three
entity program that are within your locality. And this is where you'll get the fantastic opportunity
to continue to build with them. This is a program that we're building together
and I need you to understand that our goal is to ensure that this can serve your purpose
and that's the only goal that we have here. For us to get it right, it will require a commitment.
For us to get it right, it will require that we hold builders together as we're building,
we're learning from it, we're making it perfect with a single purpose of ensuring
that the young Nigerians who are passionate about finding a place for themselves in the global
economy are given the chance but most importantly the Nigeria becoming a technician that I can
indeed be recognized for. So at this point I invite my colleague Fola to talk more about the details
but before we get into that actually, I think there's something I'd like to show you, you know,
which is the overwhelming support that we've gotten from across the country. For those of
you guys who have been following me online, I've talked a lot about this. In less than 30 days,
we've had about 1.52 million applications. This is quite significant for any country in the world.
There in mind that this is a program that is still ongoing, application is still going to be open,
so people are allowed to apply. So as you can see on the screen, we've had about 1.5 million
applications. We also put out applications for those who may be willing to support partners,
right, those who may be willing to provide support services to us and we've received
over 27,000 applications from providers and over 2,000 applications from training partners.
These are people that we expect to have value to this program. And when you look at the second
graph that you can see, you see, from Canada alone, we had over 862,000 applications.
We had over 50,000 applications. Lagos had about 87,000 applications. This is how much
interest that exists in this program. And you can see that there are people from across the
country that are willing to be part of the global workforce for education, for technology or other.
And it doesn't stop there. If you break this down into local government areas,
there are local government areas that many of you may not even know that we've seen significant
applications from. You can see places like Ifo, which is my own state about 2,000 applications
just from Ifo only. You can see places like Funtra, which is one of my favorite places.
With also over 6,000, almost 7,000 applications. If I continue to touch on it, you can see.
But Tagawa had over 2,700, almost 3,000 applications. And that's where we've seen.
This is on a program that is skewed to the urban areas only. This is a program that is received
attention from all across the nation. And you can also see what we've done. We've mapped this
on the sanitary district so that we can get support from our leaders in ensuring that we
actually deliver this program well. Of course, the most painful reflection has always been what we
know. They're still very overwhelming application from male as compared to female.
But we still have good applications as well. This is over 400,000 applications from women
across the country. If we go into the data analytics and we look at additional details,
we saw so many exciting things. And these things are where we empower us to actually be able to
help and deliver these services appropriately. A lot of unemployed people, over half a million people
that wants to be part of this. And we hope that by the virtue of them being part of this program,
technology workforce and fine gameful employment. You can see students, quite a number of them,
self-employed people. And if you continue to break it down, on that age overview, we had
mostly between 26 to 37-year-olds applying, almost 720 or 750,000 people applied in that category.
And you can see we even had a lot of people around the age of 18 and below. A lot of people are both
45 as well willing to learn. So this is not just something for the very, very young people.
You can see in terms of education overview, we had so many people looking to be part of this.
We have a bachelor's degree, which is exciting. We hope that by being part of this program,
they also get the opportunity to find good jobs and contribute to their family, but also society
at large as well. You can also see where people want to learn. The bulk of the people want to
become software developers, which I think is an exciting area. The gap there is significant.
We think if you become one of the greatest software engineers, finding something to do
will always not be a problem for you. And you can see the breakdown up to DevOps,
game development, cloud computing. These are the sort of things that we've seen under this program.
We are extremely excited and we hope that you are as excited as we are. So at this point,
I'll invite Fola to join us to talk more about the details and how this is going to run over the
coming months. Thank you so much. Fola, over to you.
Thank you very much, Honorable Minister. For our first batch of 30,000 people, we applied
a hybrid method of learning. And what that means is that we expect that our learners
will apply online training through selected and standardized online content providers.
And you'll add this with learning physically in communities through our applied learning clusters.
As the Honorable Minister pointed out, we received over 20,000 applications and at the time of
reviewing for the first batch, we already had across 10,000. So how does this work? The online
learning is self-paced learning that the fellows will use using structured online content.
This content is a world class and allows our fellows to be truly, truly global in the way they
learn. They will then apply this learning that they've learned weekly in the clusters that are
spread across their locality. We don't want people to learn and sit down in their house alone.
We want them to learn and be able to apply this. We believe that the training providers that
will be supporting the founders, the fellows, will be applying the content that they've learned
online and helping them practice this in the real world to create a truly, truly exponential
and experiential learning experience. To get to 1%, we received over 1.5 million applications.
And this 1%, the 30,000 people that are now in this 1% batch. The next one, please.
We had to look at the people who completed their profiles. We had 700,000 profiles that
had been completed that had been spread across the 36 states and the FCT.
To look at this, we asked where our content providers, our applied learning clusters,
where this situated. And we looked at the skills that are offered by these training providers.
And then we applied filters such as making sure we have good diversity mix, that we have a good mix
of skill level, and that we are sure that the people who will be practicing and who will be learning
have shown good commitment levels. And we asked our fellows this. We asked them how many hours would
you be willing to provide to learning? We asked them, would you be willing to spend your resources
for the first phase? You know, resources in this case being internet, being time. And we believe
that after this, we will learn how to train. We'll continue to learn how to train. And even though
we still had a lot more people than we were going to select, we then applied an algorithm
that shows random people who selected, who qualified, beg your pardon, for this phase.
To select our training providers, we asked our training providers to show us evidence of
training that they've completed in the past. We asked them to show their track record.
Out of the 10,000 people that applied, over 1,000 people were able to show that they had,
you know, that carried out trainings like this in the past. Because we truly believe that to
build a tech nation, we need training providers that have the experience and have the right
commitment levels. 700 people fill out this application and through that, we're able to select
our first 120 training providers. It is worthy to note that training providers who are part of
this 1% have joined our fold. But for those who are not part of this 1%, there is so much more
as we go down the line, as we go to the 10%, as we go to the 100%, they can expect to be part of
this truly transformational program. During the course of the three months program, we expect
fellows to go through over 72 hours of blended learning. We expect them to carry out this program
over three months. And as at the heart of it, we expect them to be training with job
a job mindset. And so to do this, we will be supporting them in job placement and we'll be
introducing perks and benefits along the way. In a few minutes, I'll be inviting my colleague,
Francis, to talk about what happens to the people who have not been selected for this 1%.
But I would like to reiterate once more that training providers who have not been selected
for this 1% will be invited to the 10% and the 100% phases. Thank you very much. Francis,
over to you.
Thank you very much, Fola, for, you know, talking about the 1% phase. And also, I was selected
the first 10,000 people and training providers. We're very excited about what we call in the
3MCC learning community. We have seen incredible turnouts, like the honorable minister said,
over 1.5 million people have indicated an interest. And even though we can only take 1%,
which is 30,000, for this first batch, we have created something called the 3MCC learning
community in partnership with IHS Towers. The 3MCC learning community is going to be accessible to
everyone across all 74 local governments in Nigeria. So it means that the fact that you don't get into
this first batch doesn't mean that we're leaving you alone. We're actually going to be there with
you to support your learning journey every step of the way. Now, what would the learning community
entail? In the learning community, you would all be grouped into clusters based on your local
governments and based on your state and what you would like to study. So it means that wherever you
are across the country, if you like to study data science, you like to study artificial intelligence,
we're going to give you access to structured online content for technical skills. So it means the very
best world-class content that you need to be able to go on a self-paced learning for you to achieve
and view the capacity that you need will give you access to it. Now, in addition to this access,
you're also going to get community managers across each state. So these community managers are going
to be there to support the learners across all local governments across your learning journey.
So it means that if you're learning data science and you do need to provide three months period,
if you need support in week one with something you're trying to get a sense of,
your community manager is there to be able to support you across the journey. In addition to
your community manager, we're also going to have mentors and facilitators across all states
who would also support your learning journey as you go through your self-paced learning.
In addition to that, we've learned and we've seen from the incredible talent that is present in
the Nigerian and the African technology ecosystem that peer to peer learning communities are extremely
important. So we expect that when you come into these communities with people who also want to learn
the same things as you, together you can all collaborate and work together to be able to
build the capacity that you need. Virtual is not alone and is not enough. That is why we're ensuring
that truly community managers and truly clusters are also going to have physical elements. So if
you're learning data science, you're learning cybersecurity, you're learning cloud computing.
Every single month, in fact, probably multiple times a month, you'd have access to physical events
and physical meet-ups where you commit auto learners and you can exchange ideas as you go
around along your learning journey. It is important to note that we think that the learning community
is an incredible opportunity for people to be able to go on their self-paced learning.
If you have seen the 3MTC program and you have gotten interest in the program and in something
you want to learn, the fact that you don't get into the training doesn't mean you don't get access
to all of the resources that you need. Through the 3MTC learning community, you still get access
to all of the resources that you need to achieve the goals that you want to achieve.
So please, we're going to send more information about the learning community. Right after now,
after I invite my partner, Miami, to talk about partnerships, we're also going to send emails
through the selected fellows, through the selected providers and also to the learning
community with the next steps about the program. Thank you very much. I will now invite
Miami to talk about partnerships. Over to you, Miami.
Thank you, Frances. So to achieve our vision of training and policing 3MTC would like partners
to collaborate with us in policing the talents to full-time opportunities and also internship
rules. We would also like as funding. That's because we are just at the prototype stage.
So we need partners to support the project to provide scholarship for the fellows. We would also need
spaces and this is in all the clusters to get access to resources where our fellows can have
access to the learning community to leverage on their resources and learn. We would also need
access to outsourcing companies to provide our fellows with opportunities to access remote jobs
that's globally and also we would also need asset financing. As you earlier know that
our Honorable Minister has said that there's not going to be laptops given for free but
there's going to be access in form of loans. So with this, we need access asset financing
organizations to support the project by providing the fellows with access to devices and other assets
and then we would also provide perks and benefits. This may come in data bundles and much more for
the fellows and other other categories of partners to provide value to our fellows and learning community
members. Thank you and I would like to call on the Honorable Minister to wrap up. Thank you.
Thank you.
Brilliant. Thank you, Miriam. And thanks, everyone, for staying true. Thank you for watching.
There's something that has been profound since I've been appointed a minister.
And that, then, is the deep passion and interest
by our president, President Bola Ahmed, to ensure that we create opportunity
that can help us grow our economy significantly. For those who follow me online,
this is where the message about building, this is where it came from.
The president is very clear that for us to achieve
and get to that desired nation that we all wish for our country.
Now, we must all be passionate about building for this country.
And there's no way we can build, if we don't empower young people,
with the right skill set, with the opportunity that technology offers for
us to leapfrog development in our country today,
we believe that by being part of the 3MTT program,
you will stand a chance, you will stand a chance to actually be part of the solution
to all the challenges that we have in our society. And this is why this
program is important. And I'd like to again reiterate
that if you've not been selected as part of the 1%,
it is not an indication whether you qualify or not. Our goal is to
train 3 million people. And we're going to ensure that most of the people that
have applied that are interested in actually learning
will get the opportunity to be trained. So, stay there.
What you're going to get from us is on the platform which you've joined.
There will be learning opportunities that will push to you.
You will get a chance to continue to learn.
Beyond the opportunity to learn, we're working daily to look for job
opportunities for you, even some things that you can do
and the short term that will be on the platform.
We mentioned the opportunity for perks. We're talking to companies that can
continue to support those who are learning and even in some cases those who
are not. So, there's a lot that is going to be happening
as being part of this community. This is a movement that we're building together
and I believe that as we build it, we all have responsibility to ensure
that we get to track. You have to continue to contribute.
Give constructive feedback. Let's take your feedback into consideration
as we continue to make this good for you. Remember, this is a four-year program.
It doesn't start and end in the next one or two months.
This program should and will exist for the next four years of this administration.
I think at this point, I'd like again to appreciate
those learning communities and the organizations that have supported this
including our very own agency, the IHS, which has graciously contributed
to helping us start the learning community across all the states of this country
and our first partner to offer 3,000 internship opportunities, paid
internship opportunities for 12 months, which is the UNDP Nigeria.
We're very grateful and as we continue to conclude our partnership opportunities,
we'll continue to announce these partners and we're very bullish and
sure that this program will eventually provide the support that you need
but also help to leave our nation to where it should be.
At this point, I'll be more than happy to take a few questions from you
and I'll be here. I think about four questions or so.
So I'll be more than happy to take questions that you're asking in the
comment section of YouTube. Thank you.
After this, what I can't promise you that there will be jobs for all the
3 million people, but one thing I can promise you after this is that as we
build this program, we're not just going to give it the opportunity to get trained. We will put you in communities and the power of communities, the opportunities that come when you are among your peers.
As we continue to talk about these programs, as we continue to engage private institutions, as they continue to commit, opportunities will be made available on the 3MTT portal, so you have a chance to see it. Some of these opportunities may not even require that you're physically in an office.
There will be opportunities that you can take advantage of working remotely as well. So I'll be able to promise every 3 million persons that will be on this program a job, but we are doing our best to make sure that there's opportunity. But you also have to do your best.
As you can see, my earlier presentation, there's a massive gap in workforce.
If you learn and you acquire the right skill set, your location will never be the reason for why you can't find a job in technology.
No, absolutely not to me. If you don't get into the first, don't be from Lagos. If you don't get into the first 1%, actually you don't need to reapply. Your application is ready with us, and there's a very strong chance that you're going to be part of the second course of the 10%, which is going to be
300,000. But like I said earlier, Tomi, don't be discouraged because right from today, later today, we will list opportunities for you to continue to learn so many skills, including the one that you've chosen.
And these opportunities are things that we've secured with partner that typically you'll be required to pay for, but now you don't have to pay for them.
So you'll be able to continue to learn at home. And remember, we also talked about the learning community in which you're going to get the chance to join as well. So Tomi, don't be discouraged. The fact that you're not part of the 1%, doesn't even mean that you will not get there before the 1%, because we'll make sure that you have resources that you can continue to use to learn at home.
Opportunities on the job platform that will be there, if you continue to learn even without being part of the formal training, you'll be able to also apply to those opportunities. So please stay focused, stay focused, money to reapply. Once you've applied once, we have your details.
Once you've created your profile on the platform, you're already onboarded.
The goal will now be to ensure that you can be part of the course that you should be part of.
Fantastic. Thank you for Tima from Jos. One of my favorite places in Nigeria, of course, Fatima, the rest assured. So the difference between the applied learning cluster is that the applied learning cluster is what the 1% that we're selecting today will be part of.
So this is the cluster that we will use to gather those that have been selected.
But the learning community are communities that are based in locations where we have applications. So mostly in the states. And everyone in that state is free to join the learning community. And within the learning community, so much will be shared with you.
There will actually be physical events that you can also apply that is being led by the learning community. Because remember, IHS graciously will be paying for the salary of
learning community managers in all the states for the next four years. This is the plan. They're
going to be paying the salary of learning community managers for the next four years.
And this learning community managers, their role is to animate to pull you together as a
community. But also to ensure that there are resources that you can continue to leverage.
So again, there's clear difference. But each one of these communities are there to ensure
that you continue to learn and you have access to the resources that you require.
Fantastic. David from UMI, David is asking how does this program fit into a strategic blueprint?
The reality is that as much as we want to mainstream the use of technology to diversify
the Nigerian economy, raise the level of productivity. And ensure that our nation is where it should be.
Technology requires a strong workforce. It's not something that you can just apply if you don't
have the people to actually drive that old digital economy that we aspire to build.
This is why for us the foundation and what we call the foundational pillar
of our strategy is to ensure that we deepen and we build a strong workforce.
The workforce that can actually power the Nigerian digital economy.
So this is why this is the first program we're actively launching because without the workforce everything we've set out to accomplish will be difficult for us to accomplish.
“Thank you all so much. I think that's about the questions I'll take today.
“We'll look forward to the first quote announcing themselves.
“If you get selected feel free to share on social media.
“If you don't get selected as part of the first 1%, again stay excited.
“This program is there for you. We're going to share more information for you.
“And the emails to those 1% will be coming out shortly.
“Almost immediately you start to get your email. Thank you for attending and see you soon.”
WATCH 3MTT PROGRAMME KICKOFF LIVESTREAM |Source: FMCIDE
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