NCDMB to deepen interventions for North East rehabilitation

The Nigerian Content Development and Monitoring Board (NCDMB) and the North East Development Commission (NEDC) will strengthen their collaboration in the execution of intervention programmes for the rehabilitation of persons and places that were badly impacted by insurgency.
The Executive Secretary NCDMB, Engr. Simbi Wabote and the Executive Director Operations, NEDC, Alhalji Umar Maiwada Mohammed reached this agreement when they met at NCDMB’s Abuja Liason office on Friday.
The meeting was convened for NEDC to appreciate NCDMB for its laudable intervention programmes in the North East, as part of efforts by oil and gas stakeholders in line with the Buhari Plan for the North East.
The meeting also reviewed progress made with respect to NCDMB North East interventions, namely, Fair chance Initiative, NCDMB Neighbourhood Project and Deworming Program of Future Assured Initiative. The two leaders also explored other areas of collaboration including vocational skills acquisition programme for youths in the North East region as well as partnership in the development of strategy for achieving 30 percent Local Content in the 3,050 megawatts Mambilla power project.
Team Lead for the NCDMB North East Project, Mr. Abdulmalik Halilu listed the achievements of the NCDMB Fair Chance Initiative to include the three months training of 107 internally displaced persons in plumbing, welding, carpentry, bead making, general electrician, GSM phone repairs, soft skills and soap making.
He noted that the Board also provided the trainees with starter packs, created online marketing platform and registered them as cooperative associations.
The Board also conducted a three months mentorship programme where the trainees passed through entrepreneurship training by Industrial Training Fund and were assigned to construction sites and productive ventures.
Next steps would be to assign the trained construction workers to NCDMB neighbourhood project, allocate production centers for bead making and soap making trades, brand and link trainees to market outlets and online trading platforms and monitor their growth.
Halilu also reported that the NCDMB Neighbourhood Project had also recorded notable achievements, which included the benchmarking of similar interventions in Mali, to assess buildings constructed with blocks made from Hydraulically Compressed Earth Brick (HCEB) machine, completion of architectural design of buildings, completion of geotechnical survey and confirmation of construction site in Jere LGA.
He added that the project had also received offer of 60 hectares of land for NCDMB Neighbourhood project in Bama from Shehu of Bama and identified source of clay deposits and carried out suitability test by OSKAM of Netherlands. Other achievements included the completion of training of 24 master masons in Mali, who will train masons for the Neighbourhood project, payment for two HCEB machines and identification of Dormanlong as a local fabrication partner to drive local manufacturing of components of HCEB machine as part of sustainability plan.
On the Deworming Program of Future Assured Initiative, the Team Lead confirmed that the project had achieved the deworming of 60,000 pupils across Borno, Adamawa and Yobe States and distributed 55,000 Ribena drinks, tooth brushes and Toothpaste to boost oral Hygiene amongst the pupils.
The project had also administered folic acid and Iron tablets to 12,500 pregnant women across Borno, Adamawa and Yobe States and trained health workers and school teachers on how to deworm school children, Halilu added.