Malaysia which had fewer human and natural resources
than Nigeria has
a per capita income that is forty times that of Nigeria.
What kind
of future do you see for the
information revolution?
To understand and predict the future requires that we review the past. Our Hunter-Gatherer Age lasted millions of years; Agricultural Age lasted thousands of years; Industrial Age lasted about 100 years; and the Information Age began in the 1990's.
Last weekend, I was invited to California to meet with Malaysian officials and discuss the Malaysian Multimedia Supercorridor. The Malaysian government is spending $5 billon dollars to enable it to skip the Industrial Age and jump into the Information Age. The Malaysian prime minister believes that investing billions of dollars in high technology will enable Malaysia to become a developed country by the year 2020.
Nigerian government should study what Malaysia is doing or risk being left in the dust. It should be remembered that Malaysia and Nigeria were economically at the same level when Nigeria became indepedent in 1960. Forty years later, Malaysia which had fewer human and natural resources than Nigeria has a per capita income that is forty times that of Nigeria.
Better paying jobs will be created when Africa enters the Information Age. Six of the ten richest billionaires in the United States are working in the information field. According to CNN, 50,000 jobs with average salary of $40,000 a year or more were created in Manhattan (New York) alone. These are the kind of jobs we should be creating in African cities.
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