The Chief Executive Officer of Rolep Veterinary Consult, Dr Carpe-Smith Emmanuel, while speaking at the signing ceremony, said having been in the poultry business in the last 22 years, he was encouraged by what he had seen in the ADPL Adaptive of Covenant. “I feel there is something beneficial to the agricultural economy from this product emanating from Covenant University,” he enthused.

Dr Emmanuel said the product, being a virgin merchandise, was considered as an addition to existing feeds and if well-packaged, would soon be competing with other global brands. “Covenant University is not just any University, but a reputable brand, and it wouldn’t be a difficult task to make any product from this institution acceptable,” he added.

While shedding light on the terms of the MoU, the Director, CUCRID, Professor Emeka Iweala, said the event was part of Covenant University’s drive at ensuring that most research outcomes from the Centre were commercialized and made available in the market for the public to impact lives and business. He noted that the ADPL Adaptive was on display at an exhibition in 2015, where it caught the attention of many with one of the participants at that exhibition being Rolep Veterinary Consult.

Professor Iweala told the gathering that the principal role of Covenant in the relationship would be to produce the innovative product and increase research into the product range, while Rolep Veterinary Consult would work on the commercialization process and support the Centre in pushing the product to end-users.

In his remarks, the Acting Vice-Chancellor, Professor Akan Williams, commended the leadership of CUCRID for delivering on its mandate to drive research output in the University. He charged the team to work at ensuring that the MoU was productive to the fullest extent possible.

Professor Williams extolled researchers in the University for consistently delivering on one of the benchmarks, upon which reputable and quality universities were ranked, by steadily and continuously rolling out unique research products. He attributed the successes of Covenant in the last 18 years to the God-factor at work in the lives of faculty, staff and students of the University.

“We have the talents, we are creating the enabling environment, and shortly, our research outputs and products will be received globally, as we work towards excellence on all fronts,” he added.

The Professor of Analytical/Environmental Chemistry appealed to government to create enabling environment that would facilitate the patronage of local products, and at the same time make funding available to enterprising institutions to carry out local production.

The event, held at the conference room of the Vice-Chancellor, was witnessed by the Director, Financial Services, Pastor Babatunde Onatola; Deputy Director, CUCRID, Dr Oluwatobi Stephen; representative of the Legal Unit, Barrister Faith Lawani; a lead researcher into the ADPL Seed Extract, Mrs Taiwo Owoeye, and CUCRID’s Principal Information Officer, Mr Emmanuel Igban.

Mrs Taiwo Owoeye and Mrs D.K Akinlabu, it will be recalled, had in August 2020 won gold for Best Presentation and Outstanding Creativity and Innovativeness for their ADPL Seed Extracts entry at the World Invention Creativity Olympic (WICO) 2020. The event was organized by the Korea University Invention Association in Seoul, South Korea.