Indigenous Technology and Innovation Capability Building in Nigerian Upstream Oil and Gas Subsector: The Academia Perspective

Nigeria‟s government has made certain efforts to improve the participation of indigenous players in the oil industry through local content policy and marginal field development initiative. To what extent these policies have been implemented and fruitful is yet to be known. This study assessed the technology and innovation capability building in the oil industry from the university academia perspective. Questionnaire was administered on 120 university academia across the country to elicit information from them. The study found that majority (66.3%) of them ranked the state of equipment in their laboratory to be low compared to the state-of-the-art, 47.1% of them claimed to engage in Developmental research, and 66.3% of them opined that R&D funding in their departments were not adequate. The level of interaction of the academia with the oil industry was also found to be low. Factors such as high interest rate charged by banks, low commercialisation potential of university research and lack of entrepreneurial spirit among others are hindering the interaction of academia with other stakeholders in the oil industry.