(514e) The Nigerian Society of Chemical Engineers: Challenges and Opportunitiesfacing Chemical Engineers in Nigeria

The Nigerian society of chemical engineers, NSChE, welcomes the invitation of its President to participate as a delegate to the Centennial Celebrations of A.I.Ch.E at the Annual Conference taking place in Philadelphia from Nov. 16-21, 2008.

The NSChE appreciates the opportunity extended to its members since the year 2007 to become members of AIChE at substantially discounted rates which also include useful benefits. We share similar objectives, as a society, for the continuous professional improvement of our members and the advancement of chemical engineering in all areas of human endeavour.

As a mark of our appreciation and solidarity with your organisation on this occasion, I present this paper to inform the AIChE membership of our society's role in Nigeria.

Nigeria is a developing nation situated in the west coast of Africa. It has a population of 140 million and covers an area about 1.5 times the size of the state of Texas. It became an independent country in 1960, about two hundred years after the thirteen colonies in the now USA also became independent of the same colonial masters, Great Britain.

On the 4th of July 1957, the first Nigerian chemical engineer graduated from the Victoria University of Manchester, UK. Today, there are about 13,000 Nigerian graduate chemical engineers. About 4,000 of these live and work in Nigeria. The NSChE is thirty-nine years old and has a membership of 2,000, including a North American chapter.

I present in the rest of my paper some of the onerous challenges facing chemical engineers and the potential opportunities available to us in our country. I will also present some of the reasons for our present situation to enable AIChE members and executives appreciate the value of their contributions to the professional improvement of our members.