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T H I S D AY • FRIDAY, JUNE 30, 2017
BUSINESSWORLD
NEWS
Stakeholders Suggest Ways to Explore Opportunities in Maritime Industry Peter Uzoho Maritime industry players have said that good management models, strategies, and policies are needed to tap from the huge opportunities in the industry, which they said could serve as alternative source of revenue to Nigeria and Africa. Delivering a lecture at the 2nd International Maritime Business-to-Business Conference and Exhibition, held recently in Lagos, President, Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Chief Nike Akande, said Nigeria has marine resources to develop a sustainable blue economy that would be used to support the traditional economy. The event with the theme: “Dynamism and Maritime Investment in Africa,” was organised by ZOE Maritime Resources Limited. Akande stated that these potential needed to be managed and harnessed to provide additional capacity for government to generate more revenue, create jobs and reduce poverty and unemployment in Nigeria. “The exploitation of inherent potential and opportunities in a blue economy is a major motivation in presenting this public lecture. I hope to see this event making a business case for the development of a
sustainable and vibrant blue economy in Africa, ”Akande said. According to her, there is a compelling need for diversification of African economies that depend heavily on minerals and commodities, and have coastal resources to leverage on, to grow their economies. Akande noted that some African countries were faced with declining government revenues and slowing growth. “Accompanying these are rising inflation, worsening poverty level, rising unemployment rate and weakening consumer demand, ”she added. The Convener of the conference and Chairman, ZOE Marine Resources Limited, Mrs. Oritsematosan Edodo-Emore, explained that the aim of the conference and exhibition was to attract foreign direct investments into the maritime industry in Nigeria as well as to stimulate the Nigerian ports as the hub of maritime activities in the West and Central African Sub region through panel discussions and networking sessions. She said that the conference sought to address the lapses in the industry and find solutions to them, noting that Nigeria has the courage and ability to tackle these
challenges because it has the greatest cargo share in Africa. She also stated that the industry was still developing adding that Nigeria has a long way to go in harnessing its resources for the benefit the citizenry. In a communiqué read at the end of the conference by one of the Rapporteurs and Senior Associate, SPA Ajibade & Co, Mrs. Adetola Ayanru, the stakeholders suggested that audit of existing legislations be carried out; make amendments where necessary; and new legislation must be put in place to encourage the exploration of the opportunities embedded in the blue economy. The communiqué reads in part, “there should be compliance with international standards by shipping agents and operators in safe-guarding the welfare of boarding officers in the duration of inspection activities. There should be clear and transparent declaration of actual description by the exporter to enable adequate preparation by the inspecting officer. Inspections of waste management facilities to ensure they are carried out according to law by the relevant agencies to ensure a cleaner environment.
Unites Academy Partners Cisco on ICT Olympics for Girls Emma Okonji Following gender discrimination that has led to lack of confidence in girls to enjoy the value that information and communications technology (ICT) has to offer, Unites Academy Foundation, a non-governmental organisation has partnered Cisco, a technology solution company, to address the ugly situation among girls. According to the Foundation, girls are particularly at a disadvantage as they are often not encouraged to take up courses in Science, Technology, Education and Mathematics (STEM) fields, which are hugely male dominated fields. This has therefore created a misconception and stereotype that girls are less wired for technology and ICT careers than their male counterparts. In order encourage girls to take a career in science and technology related courses, Unites Academy Foundation, last week in Lagos, organised the second edition (south-west regionals) of the National ICT Champions Olympics for girls. The competition, which took place at the Queens College gymnasium, was aimed at providing a platform for the girl child to demonstrate their skills in ICT, inspire girls in Nigeria to embrace ICT and encourage entrepreneurship skills and ICT competency among girls. Students from Queens
College being the host school, FGGC Sagamu, FGC Akure, FSTC Yaba, FGC Ijanikin, FSTC Ikare, FGC Ikirun, FGC Idoani, FGGC Akure, SMAC, FGGC Oyo, FGC Ogbomoso, New Estate Baptist School, FSTC Ijebu Imushin, and eight other schools were in attendance. While welcoming the female students, the Director/Principal of Queens College, Chief Mrs. Bola Are, said: “The world is now a global village courtesy of ICT and so girls must use ICT to develop their brains, impact their lives positively and add value to society.” The Director, Secondary and Basic Education, Ministry of Education, who was represented by the Director/Principal, Kings College Lagos, Mr. A.O.Thomas emphasised the importance of the young women’s experience from the competition which would be beneficial to them in the future. The Executive Director of Unites Academy Foundation, Mr. Toyin James Olatayo stated that inspiring and encouraging young girl’s interest in technology would empower them to take their rightful positions as future leaders in a competitive world and position them to become innovative and successful future leaders. He reiterated the determination of Unites Academy Foundation to close the gender digital divide by deciding to establish a network of Internet of Things (IoT) innovation centres in secondary
and tertiary institutions. After three hours session of creativity and applied skills in Computer System Assembling and Troubleshooting, Logo Design, Quiz Competition, ICT Presentation, Internet and Networking Skills, Game Development and Coding, the results of winners were announced. For the ICT Quiz, FGGC Akure won, while FGC Ijanikin was announced as first runner up, and SMAC as second runner up. For Computer System Assembling, FGGC Sagamu won, while Queens College was announced as 1st runner up, and FSTC Yaba as 2nd runner up. For Logo Design competition, Queens College won, while FGC Ijanikin was announced as 1st runner up and FSTC Ijebu Imusin was announced as 2nd Runner up. For Scratch Programming competition, Queens College came first, FSTC Ijebu Imusin was the first runner up and SMAC was the second runner up. Medals were presented to winners in various levels of the competition. Queens College won two gold and one silver medals. FGGC Akure won one gold medal, FGGC Sagamu won one gold medal, while FGC Ijanikin won two silver medals. Also, FSTC Ijebu Imusin won one silver medal, and one bronze medal. SMAC won a total of two bronze medals, while FSTC Yaba won one bronze medal.
RISK MANAGEMENT WATCH Robert Mbonu
Risk Data: Information is Power Data - its reliance and integrity ultimately drive risk management outcomes and decisions. It has been established from previous writings that Enterprise Risk Management (ERM) is about timely scrutiny and proactive management of risk across businesses. For an ERM framework to be deemed a success, it must be seen to deliver better informed and timely decision-making capabilities. A top-down perspective on enterprise risk management (ERM) is what typically obtains. This approach underestimates the importance of data, which is the core bottom-up enabler for ERM, and compromises the bigger-picture requirements of a sound ERM framework, including the longer-term strategic advantages of a solid data foundation. Obtaining the right information at the right time, which is appropriate to the business aspect, is at the very heart of risk management. This information might be in the form of data, specific stress situations, influences, judgement and assumptions. Data is not very useful on its own but it is at the very core of risk intelligence after it has been ordered into logical information using various means. The starting point is to focus on the business aspect that is under scrutiny. Then a list of possible data sources should be listed under external and internal headings before resources are allocated to the obtaining of the information. It is a mistake to narrow the field of possible areas of data too soon, because that can create bias. For example, just looking at past data to predict the performance of a particular risk is a bit like a pilot guessing the flight plan for an airplane. One degree of error at the commencement of the journey could result in a final destination that is several kilometres from the correct place. Past data is useful, but it needs to be interrogated closely to look at where there are aberrations in the risk trends and to examine reasons for any changes. Where there is little data to rely on, then other sources of information should be gathered which are relevant to the risk area under examination. With operational risk, there is usually the challenge of little internal data, such as incidents, accidents, near misses or recorded errors by which a good forecast of the future performance of the risk can be assessed. Capturing the correct data can prove critical to ensuring that the right people discuss, monitor and manage the risks appropriate for consideration at each level of the organisation. Deficiencies in raw data are not the only obstacle to achieving this objective. When poor data is combined with the management of risk in silos, ERM is fundamentally undermined. Silos are perhaps inevitable for day-to-day, local operational purposes, but this approach to management of risks is inadequate for the organisation as a whole. Once a holistic view of key risk data has been achieved, material improvements in operational efficiency both at the local level as well as at the enterprise level can be achieved. The source of data now brings to question. Incident reports, near misses and insurance
claims are grist to the mill for risk analysts who are looking for data upon which to analyse risk, but often the near misses are ignored, which is quite unfortunate as they are most useful for being able to predict how risk is performing. Complaints from customers are also a rich source of information about risk performance, and trends from these complaints can be indicative of risk management improvement requirements. Care should be taken in order to encourage an open reporting environment so that people do not falsify the information provided if they fear punishment. Key performance indicators, audit reports and management reports are also great areas for tracking risk changes. For that purpose, dashboards are more useful, particularly if trends can be tracked. External information is most useful when trying to benchmark one organisation’s risk performance against another and being able to predict the way in which a risk might change. To understand how limitations in data availability across the enterprise frustrates the holistic management of individual firms, one only needs look at the recent subprime crisis, which morphed into the liquidity crisis, and then the economic crisis, which in turn led to the wider contagion that we experienced post 2008. Ultimately, banks did not have access to the data needed to enable the robust management of risk across the enterprise. The federal government recently launched the Economic Recovery Growth Plan (ERGP), with the objective of restoring the country to a positive and sustained growth path, investing in the Nigerian people to improve their living standards, and building an economy that is globally competitive. With little information on the number of initiatives being put in place to ensure effective implementation, the source and reliability of the data that will be employed is critical to its success. The task force constituted to drive the implementation will rely on a continuous supply of rich and reliable data from The National Bureau of Statistics. Any flaws in the source data will result in less than optimized achievement of this noble government objective. Risk information is founded on getting the right source and type of data and manipulating it so that the data reveals the knowledge that leads to information. The seeking of the right information to support the risk analysis is a process of hard work and deliberate strategy. Whilst short cuts can be made, assumptions jumped to, and gut feeling used; there is no substitute for solid supporting data which is relevant to the risk activity in hand. •Mbonu, FERP, CIRM(UK), HCIB, MsRM (Stern), studied Engineering, is an experienced Banker and Enterprise Risk Management professional. Earned a post graduate degree in Risk Management from New York University Stern School of Business, and is a member of the Institute of Risk Management -UK. Can be reached on 09092092046 (SMS Only); email: rm4riskmgt@gmail.com