Quality Data Through Enterprise Data Management

Enterprise data management and enterprise content management are about the creation, organization, and consolidation of reference data among large companies that operate locally and internationally. Through this, data integration is made easier and information dissemination is made highly reliable.

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Reference data is maintained and stored by different business units. If one unit needs a particular documentation from another, he will request for it. It is just that easy. But the burden is not on the requesting, it is on the waiting. Unless the request demands immediate attention or it is of high priority, you can't expect that you will have it in a second. You will have it even much later if what you want is in another branch that has a different time zone. These instances will surely delay office functions as well as the delivery of goods and services. Consequently, this will also hurt sales. Discrepancy is another major setback. Other than misinformation among those in the company, it will affect the reputation of the company in the business world. This may convert to loss of clients and withdrawal of trading partners. These are the reasons why large companies need enterprise data management.

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Enterprise data management goes hand-in-hand with enterprise content management. It's necessary to ensure that the information contained in all channels is of dependable quality.

Quality information, meaning accurate, consistent and up-to-date, must be what's stored and contained in all archives, documents, e-mails, newsletters and even instant messages. Doing so is essential to the functions of all company departments and branches. It ensures that enterprise data is organized and searchable even by keywords so users can find what they are looking for in just a matter of seconds. Not only does it offer easy access but also simple operation. This, therefore, contributes a lot in the smooth and effective business workflow of the entire company.

Generally, enterprise data management and enterprise content management increase company productivity and ensure timely delivery of products and services. They prevent discrepancies and inaccuracies as well as minimize the mistakes normally committed by employees. They avoid miscommunications and help in controlling the data that must be made available to the entire information supply chain. Of course, confidential information is still kept as such. Another important thing here is that there will be a significant savings in terms of the cost for storing hard copies of office files; using papers, printers, and inks; sending mails to clients; hiring people to handle enterprise data and others.

Quality Data Through Enterprise Data Management

Stibo Systems' enterprise data management and enterprise content management strategies support a company's need for an organized and consolidated record-keeping. Exchange of information within the company and among its many units and departments are made more effective because of these strategies.

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Youth Crime Reduction Through Enterprise Development

In 2008 alone, the country lost .7 billion in oil profits due to militant violence in the oil-rich but volatile Niger Delta region1. A Presidential Technical Committee report to the Nigerian government attributed the fiscal loss to armed militant activity on oil installations that resulted in shutdowns and spillages. The conflict has significantly hamstrung oil exports - the country's prime revenue earner - from 2.6 million barrels in 2006 to a current figure of just 1.78 million barrels. The human component of this economic tragedy is even more appalling: at least 1,000 lives lost and an additional 300, including 44 foreign oil workers and businessmen, taken hostage.

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The Nigerian government considers four of the nine states in the delta region as conflict zones, and foreigner travel to these locations is strictly restricted. The 70,000 square km area, a mainstay of the country's economy, accounts for 85% of state revenue2. Armed insurgency in the region traces its roots to a perceived sense of neglect by both oil companies and the national government, a sentiment that is corroborated by empirical evidence. Despite its strategic and economic significance, human development indices for the Niger Delta region are starkly behind national averages. Further, the pollution resulting from oil and gas prospecting have decimated indigenous sources of livelihood like fishing, and brought home disease, malnutrition and high fatality rates, besides serious environmental repercussions.

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The localize symptoms in Niger Delta are however only part of the problem. Poverty remains endemic despite the billions flowing into the national coffers. Successive government policies in the last century failed to include the wide majority of Nigerians; 76 million of whom are officially classified below the poverty line, while an astounding 35% of the population continues to live in abject poverty3.

Poverty however exacts an inevitable social toll, and for an impoverished people, crime is often an easy step from deprivation. Although reliable independent data is hard to come by, Nigeria has a massive unemployment rate that adds thousands of new graduates to its list of jobless each year. The country's prominent 'This Day' newspaper reports in a September 2007 story that Nigerian youths constitute half the population, 95% of which is unemployed4. By the government's own admission, over 70% of the population was unemployed that year. The figure has since been slashed to just below 29% to coincide with recent independent World Bank findings. Even at this rate however, over 40 million Nigerians are currently jobless. Significantly, policy changes effected after 1999 have done little to assuage the situation, largely because of a misplaced focus on capital-intensive ventures that generated few employment opportunities. The situation was made worse by acute infrastructural shortages, forcing hundreds of factories and informal sector industries to lay-off workers.

Consequently, youth crime has steadily been on the rise, fed by decades of under-investment in the social sector, together with deficient poverty-alleviation and ineffective unemployment-reduction initiatives. Over the years, billions in annual oil revenue pouring in to the country hiked the bar of its economic and social aspirations, resulting in a climate of criminal proclivity.

For a nation with millions of jobless youths, the gross outcome has been a surge in violent crime by individuals and gangs, including frequent muggings, assault, burglary, carjacking, extortion and kidnapping. Fraud is an especially huge criminal sub-sector here. In fact the US State Department specifically warns Nigeria-bound travellers to be wary of innovative scams hatched over the Internet that pose the risk of both financial loss and personal danger.

Over many years of political and social turmoil, the accumulation of small crimes has transformed Nigeria into an established transit point on drug routes headed for European and North America. Due to its strategic location, the country has also emerged as a centre of massive economic corruption and criminal activity. Since 1999 however, a climate of renewed collaboration with international law-enforcement agencies has resulted in substantial crackdowns on syndicated criminal activities across the country. A notable achievement in this regard has been a national initiative against drug money laundering, which resulted in Nigeria's removal from the Financial Action Task Force's list of non-cooperative countries in 2006. However, the country's commitment to fighting economic crimes continues to be monitored.

The mix of poverty, inflation and unemployment in Nigeria has created a situation where opportunities for gainful employment are scarce, and criminality is often a means for survival. The same holds true for large parts of sub-Saharan Africa where legitimate opportunities are shrinking. Across Nigeria, the highest incidence is of property crimes, relating to survival - burglary, armed robbery, cheating etc. Inherent flaws in the criminal justice system only add to the problem. Tackling law and order is especially difficult due to the existence of a triple criminal justice system, which includes a Criminal Code, a Penal Code (based on Islamic edicts) and Customary Law, some of which are informal and unwritten.

Youth crime is currently one of the biggest hurdles on Nigeria's road to accelerated economic development. One of the government's core priorities, in the context of long-term developmental goals, remains the mobilization of its substantial youth population to lead an enterprise revolution. Nigeria's emerging leadership has in principle at least awakened to the urgency of implementing fundamental initiatives concerning the creation of new jobs for sustainable and inclusive growth. For Nigeria, entrepreneurship development is a social as well as an economic imperative. The following aspects require critical consideration as part of any concerted government effort in this regard:

* In the contest of Nigeria's troubled past, maintaining political stability and authority of democratic institutions are critical to the success of any worthwhile youth revival initiative.

* Improvement in per capita income, standard of living and related human development indices through implementation of informed social and economic policy changes.

* Effective poverty alleviation programs that focus on enterprise development as a viable means to legitimate prosperity. Mobilization of the youth workforce to promote rapid entrepreneurial development in rural and urban areas alike.

* Massive overhaul of the education system to correctly address local realities. Focus on vocational and skill development programs that translate to practical job opportunities.

* Rehabilitation programs for Niger Delta militants and other criminal elements that focus on equipping them with practical skills and leveraging their economic potential.

For a country beset by a bewildering array of problems, piece-meal measures can hardly be effective in the long run. Hopefully, Nigeria has at least started taking positive steps.

In June this year, the government of President UM Yar'Adua announced a declaration of amnesty for militants in the Niger Delta region. The proclamation acknowledges that militancy arose out of the state's inability to meet the aspirations of the local population, and the need for sustainable development in the Delta states. It goes on to add that most of the militant are "able-bodied youths whose energies could be harnessed for the development of the Niger Delta and the nation at large5."

As is the case with most seemingly intractable problems, the problem of Nigeria's youth crime also contains its solution!

Youth Crime Reduction Through Enterprise Development

By Peter Osalor FCCA, CTA Partner Peter Osalor and Co Chartered Certified Accountants and President, www.Success in Your Business.com.

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Poverty Eradication in Nigeria Through Agriculture and Enterprise Revolution

Circumstances changed radically with the oil boom of the 1970s, as the discovery of vast oil and gas reserves in the strategically significant sub-Saharan nation turned its fortunes overnight. The windfall transformed Nigeria's agricultural landscape into a gigantic oil field crisscrossed by more than 7,000 km of pipelines connecting 6,000 oil wells, two refineries, innumerable flow stations and export terminals. The colossal investments in the sector paid off, with unofficial estimates suggesting Abuja raked in more than 0 billion in petrodollars in the last decade alone.

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Unfortunately, the obsession with non-renewables over all other sectors of the economy eventually turned Nigeria's boon into a bane. Newfound wealth spawned political instability and massive corruption in government circles, and the country was rent asunder by decades of violent civil war and successive military coups. Agriculture was one of the first casualties of the oil regime, and by the 1990s, cultivation accounted for just 5% of GDP. Farming modernisation and support continued to remain low on the list of national priorities as vast stretches of rural Nigeria gradually plunged into poverty and food scarcity. Deforestation, soil erosion and industrial pollution further hastened the down-spiral of agriculture to the point where it ended up as a subsistence activity.

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The fall of Nigerian agriculture coincided with the collapse of its macroeconomic and human development indicators. With income distribution concentrated on a few urban pockets, the majority of rural Nigeria was left reeling under massive poverty, unemployment and food shortages. A widening urban-rural divide sparked social unrest and mass migration into towns and cities. Organised urban crime became as real a security threat as militancy in the Niger Delta region. Nigeria plummeted to the bottom in world economic rankings and Africa's most populous nation acquired the unhappy distinction of having more than half (54%) of its 148 million people living in abject poverty. The World Bank coined the term "Nigerian Paradox" specifically to describe the unique condition of extreme underdevelopment and poverty in a country brimming with resources and potential. The country was ranked 80th in a 2007 UNDP poverty survey covering 108 countries.

The transition to democratic civilian rule at the end of the last century paved the way for an enthusiastic programme of economic reform and restructuring. Abuja's urgency for inclusive growth was much in evidence in the adoption of an ambitious blueprint designed to reverse trends and jumpstart a stagnating economy. The Vision 2020 document adopted under former president O Obsanjo lays out broad parameters for sustainable development with the specific goal of instating Nigeria as a global economic superpower in a time-bound manner. The 2020 goals are in addition to Nigeria's commitment to the UN Millennial Declaration of 2000 that proposes universal basic human rights by 2015.

The realisation of these allied and intertwined objectives depends entirely on Abuja's ability to bring about inclusive growth by means of an entrepreneurial revolution, while simultaneously correcting massive infrastructural shortages and administrative anomalies. Economies usually begin expanding with an initial agricultural revolution: The case of Nigeria however calls for agriculture to be part of a larger enterprise revolution that efficiently leverages the nation's extensive resources and human capital.

The intricacy of issues involved here is reflected in the fact that the National Poverty Eradication Programme of 2001 identifies agriculture and rural development as its primary area of interest. The fact that all development has to begin from the bottom-up cannot be overemphasised in the context of Nigeria, where a farming boom can ensure not just food supply and exports but also provide industrial raw materials and a market for products.

Agricultural expansion is critical to economic prosperity across Western Africa, considering the region's crippling poverty levels. A 2003 conference organised by NEPAD (New Partnership for Africa's Development) in South Africa strongly urged the promotion of cassava cultivation as a poverty eradication tool across the continent. The recommendation is based on a strategy that focuses on markets, private sector participation and research to drive a pan-African cassava initiative. What was once a rural staple and famine-reserve food has become a lucrative cash crop!

The NEPAD initiative has strong relevance for Nigeria, the world's largest cassava producer. With its large rural population and extensive farmlands, the country boasts unrivalled opportunities of transforming the humble cassava to an industrial raw material for both domestic and international markets. There is a growing and well-justified belief that the crop can transform rural economies, spur rapid economic and industrial growth and assist disadvantaged communities. While production grew steadily between 1980 and 2002 from 10,000 MT to over 35,000 MT, there is scope for significant further increase by bringing more land under cassava cultivation. Nigeria must take the lead not only in developing better production, harvesting and processing technologies, but also in finding new uses and markets for what is undoubtedly a wonder crop. Nigeria stands to make giant strides towards inclusive and sustainable development simply through the intelligent and judicious promotion of cassava farming.

The following are some of the most urgent requirements for a successful revolution in Nigerian agriculture:

o Active promotion and establishment of agro-based industries that generate employment, sustain local food requirements and encourage exports.
o Effective steps to modernise and diversify the agricultural economy as a means of buttressing entrepreneurial growth in ancillary sectors.
o Institution of a tariff system that promotes local produce against cheaper imports, together with the removal of institutional barriers against agricultural profitability.
o Subsidies on technologically advanced farm equipment and practices that help boost productivity without any adverse ecological side effects.
o An umbrella poverty alleviation programme designed specifically to promote agrarian reforms while simultaneously improving the quality of life in rural communities.
o Enhanced access to agricultural enterprise loans through a network of regulated lending institutions sympathetic to farming realities.
o Adult education programmes designed to help Nigerian farmers upgrade to locally relevant but modern methods of cultivation, marketing and distribution.
o Encouragement of both public and private sector agricultural research aimed at correcting technological constraints faced by local farming communities.

If Nigeria's agricultural potential is enormous, it is partly because more than 90% of its 91 million hectares of total land area is arable. While soil fertility is generally estimated on the lower side, the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) predicts medium to high yields across the country with optimal utilisation of resources. Combined with Nigeria's substantial rural population traditionally involved in agriculture, this projection translates to gigantic prospects in terms of agricultural productivity and, by extension, economic resurgence. For a nation emerging out of a troubled past and struggling to attain social, political and economic stability, the ideals of agricultural and entrepreneurial revolution hold vitally important. Because they are also inextricably linked in the Nigerian context, the country's future position on the world economic stage depends literally on the bounty of its harvest.

Poverty Eradication in Nigeria Through Agriculture and Enterprise Revolution

By Peter Osalor FCCA, CTA Partner Peter Osalor and Co Chartered Certified Accountants and President Success in your business.com.

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