Actuarial Professionals Take Advocacy to Ekiti, Woo Students

• FRC decries lack of professionals

Gbenga Sodeinde in Ado Ekiti

The Financial Reporting Council of Nigeria (FRC) has decried the shortage of professional Actuaries in Nigeria, revealing that only 28 practitioners remain in the country.

The Executive Secretary, FRC, Dr. Rabiu Olowo, made this statement in Ado-Ekiti, during the Nigerian Actuarial Development Programme (NADP) advocacy outreach held in the Ekiti State University, Ado-Ekiti .
Olowo, who spoke at the outreach with the theme: “Building Capacity for Actuarial Excellence in Nigeria,” described actuary as a lucrative enterprise in Nigeria and abroad that demands skilled professionals, but no graduates are willing to pursue it as a career.

He maintained that students’ interest in the profession has reduced drastically, making it difficult for the professional body to compete in the labour market like other professions.

Olowo, who was represented by the Assistant Director, Directorate of Actuarial Standards, FRC, Olasunkanmi Ayinde, emphasised the importance of Actuaries, saying they are responsible for setting accounting and financial reporting.

“Our profession sets standards, promoting good corporate governance, regulating the audit profession, protecting investors, enhancing market efficiency, amongst others” he noted
Olowo also said Actuarial Science is operated in six universities in the country, and revealed that the FRC, through the NADP, decided to return tuition fees to the best students across the six Universities, adding that they would also refund their payment if they decide to write any professional examination.

“We are recruiting Nigerian students and professionals to pick up interest in natural science because there’s an emergency in Nigeria, a country that produces more than 65,000 accountants, thousands of auditors, bankers, tax practitioners, insurance, only for us to have about less than 30 actuaries,” he added.

He said the body would expose students and people who might be interested to the easier ways of learning the ropes of the profession.
“Actuaries are the ones that help you to mitigate your risk, they solve future problems of business, they strategise and look forward to helping the organization to avoid risk, to determine what kind of investment they can invest in and what not.

“They assist in market development, risk management, evaluation and reserving but unfortunately, we have about 28 in Nigeria, and due to even capital, we have to resort to bringing in actuaries from South Africa and Kenya, which makes all these 28.

“The issue is more to make Nigeria a hub for producing actuaries. It’s a very lucrative job, more lucrative but unfortunately, most Nigerians are not aware. Out of the 273 universities in Nigeria, only six are offering Actuarial Science, and this is the fifth university we are visiting”.
A professor of Actuarial Science and Vice Chairman of NADP, Ismaila Adeleke, said the FRC regulates the activities of Actuaries, which made the council to create NADP to advocate for the increase of professionals in Nigeria.

He explained that Actuarial Science has also employed the use of artificial intelligence to aid and automate some processes of the profession, adding that the advocacy was necessary in order to bring the profession into limelight.

The Vice Chancellor of EKSU, Prof. Joseph Ayodele, hailed the FRC for its recent visit to secondary schools across the state, saying it would enable them to develop interest in the profession and later become professionals.

Ayodele, described actuarial science as a missing link that validates the integrity of financial reporting, emphasising on its crucial roles in achieving sustainable development goals.

The VC promised to partner with the programme and the practice of actuary science beyond Ekiti state in order to address the implications attached to business investments.