iCreate Skills Festival 2018, the largest skills festival in Africa took place on the 26th and 27th October 2018 at the A-Class Part, Wuse II, Abuja, Nigeria.
iCreate Skills Festival 2018, the largest skills festival in Africa took place on the 26th and 27th October 2018 at the A-Class Part, Wuse II, Abuja, Nigeria.
Vocational Education has not always been popular in Africa, this year the iCreate project focused on promoting technical and vocational educational training in Nigeria by selecting over 100 participants to compete in 84 different skills sets. These varied from technology, construction, cooking, dressmaking and hairdressing. Contestants chosen went through a rigorous selection process and chosen from different parts of Nigeria as well as the neighboring countries of Ghana and Cote d’Ivoire, each with equal representation. This was the first time that most of the contestants experienced such a high level of attention for displaying their skills.
Bosch in addition to other leading international organizations such as GIZ, Afrika-Verein, Siemens, Julius Berger, Uber, Sterling Bank, Creandola, Mafita to name some, sponsored this two-day event. On this platform, Mr. Frank Diermann, Country Business Director, Bosch Power Tools, Nigeria seized the opportunity to present Bosch’s vision and approach on TVET in Nigeria to invited guests.
Robert Bosch Nigeria focused on the construction segment of the iCreate initiatives where Bosch Power Tools was the preferred power tools used by the competitors in the segments. The construction segment was further sub divided into Woodworking, Plumbing, Bricklaying and Tiling. In each of the sub-segments, we had 15 participants competing for different prizes including representing Nigeria at the World Skills Festival taking place in Russia during 2019.
After 14 hour tasks from experts in each of the sub segments and a thorough vetting process in which expert opinions welcomed from Mr. Brahim Boussetta, Training and Content Marketing Manager, Bosch Power Tools, Morocco. Winners in each of the skills set were honored at an award night titled the “Grammies of Skills”.
The iCreate Skills Festival was also a platform for evaluating 8 business pitches from different groups that were targeted at solving a pressing issue in either the health, education, infrastructure or agricultural sector. Mr. Samson Ajayi, Retail Marketing Manager, Bosch Power Tools, Nigeria together with fellow judges from Cachez Group, Mafita UKAid, Sterling Bank Plc, GIZ and Tenecé sat to assess these ideas.
Overall, the iCreate Skills Festival 2018 was a great platform for Bosch to promote TVET in Africa. We were able to engage the attendees about our latest solutions and service offerings; and show how we change lives with our products are invented for life.
