Piql, Europe’s leading technology developer, which is also renowned globally for digital preservation in both private and public sectors, has berthed in West Africa.
Norway-based Piql AS with headquarters in Drammen in collaboration with Piql West Africa based in Accra, Ghana and Abuja, Nigeria will help drive digital preservation in the African sub-region. According to Esona Onuoha, founding partner for Piql West Africa Ltd, the new initiative will help to preserve valuable data for both the private and the public sectors specifically in Nigeria and Ghana, and generally in the West African sub-region. He added that Mr. Kanu Emejuaiwe has been appointed as the Country Manager, Nigeria for Piql West Africa and Mr. James Aggrey-Orleans is the Country Manager for Ghana.
“Nigeria, being the largest economy in Africa, and Ghana, as one of the fastest growing democracies and leading economy in Africa, have been selected to implement the digital preservation module by Piql. The advantages of Piql for the region are numerous. The Piql projects explored for the region focused on specific framework impediments and challenges within value chains related to digitization, metadata generation, digital transformation and access to authentic information, as well as secure data storage and long-term digital preservation of valuable information and its related transactions within both the public and private sectors with a primary focus on Ghana and Nigeria,” Onuoha explained.
He continued: “The challenges around the digital transformation value chains in Ghana and Nigeria are to a great extent common, and the aim of the project is to enable cross-border synergies to increase the impact of the project in the two countries, with other countries and synergies in West Africa planned in the future.”
Onuoha further stated that Nigeria and Ghana were chosen as the pioneer hubs for Piql because “Ghana and Nigeria are good countries to start because of the availability of a relatively high number of skilled technology workers.”
Temple Data, a leading Ghanaian technology firm, has recently signed an agreement with Piql and on this, James Aggrey-Orleans said, “Working with our partner, Temple Data, I have seen first hand the value that digital preservation can bring to our economies, history and culture.” On the developmental impact level, Kanu Emejuaiwe, Country manager, Piql Nigeria, stated, “Piql will aid good governance in Nigeria and improve the quality of life of the populace by providing and equipping decision makers with accurate, relevant information in a timely manner at reduced human and material cost.”
The Piql solution is the only data that is offline, digital, and migration-free. The key material is photosensitive film known as the piqlFilm, which is used to store data. The stored data is searchable like any digital storage medium. Already, the Norwegian Embassies in Nigeria and Ghana with the support of the host governments and chambers of commerce in the region have already authenticated and acknowledged the arrival of Piql in West Africa.