TETFUND sponsors 10 textbooks for use in tertiary institutions

The Federal Government has taken steps to reduce foreign publications’ domination in the nation’s higher education institutions, as it unveiled ten new textbooks supported by the Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFUND) in Abuja.

Nigeria’s tertiary education institutions have become dependent on books published outside the country and the consequences of this, is pressure on the demand for foreign exchange.

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Speaking at the public presentation of the books, the Minister of Education said the dependence on foreign academic publications portends a great danger to the nation’s education sector, which can only be addressed by boosting indigenous authorship.

The quality of most academic publications in the country leaves much to be desired.

[Scarcity of tertiary level texts books in Nigeria has reached a crisis proportion as evident not only in the quality of books available but also in the quantity of books produced locally.

The need to tackle this crisis head-on resulted in the establishment of the Technical Advisory Group whose mandate includes collaboratively working with the agency to ensure quality books are churned out by Nigerian authors.

TETFUND presented ten sponsored textbooks published by the university of Ibadan, to tackle scarcity of tertiary level textbooks.

Chairman of TETFund TAG, Sonny Echono called for more empowerment of the nation’s publishing centres.

It is expected that nurturing the culture of quality authorship and the production of indigenous books will not only ensure the availability of relevant books in the diverse subject areas that take cognisance of our local environment and sensitivities, but will also safeguard national pride and reduce the demand for foreign exchange.