About Us

About Us

The need to improve the quantity and quality of goods and services available for consumption in Nigeria as a means of increasing total wealth is a task to which successive Nigerian governments have attached great importance. Between 1963 and 1985, several panels and commissions were set up by the various governments of Nigeria, to work out the modalities for instituting productivity consciousness in the nation’s work system.

Primarily, the attention of government was first drawn to the issue of higher productivity as a means of evolving a rational process for determining workers’ wages and for resolving industrial relations problems. The 1963 Morgan Wages Commission and the Okotie-Eboh Tripartite Agreement of 1964 recommended among others, the establishment of a National Wages Advisory Council whose function was to advise government within the economy and the trends in productivity. However, the Adebo Wages and Salaries Review Commission of 1970 recommended the setting up of the Productivity, Prices and Incomes Board (PPIB) responsible for establishing productivity schemes based on the formulation of guidelines on productivity improvement. Thereafter in 1971, the Whitely Council recommended the establishment of a National Productivity Centre (NPC). The Udoji Service Review Commission which was established in 1974 emphasized the importance of a result-oriented public service in addition to stressing the need for increased National Productivity.

At jointly-organised conference in Ibadan between the Productivity, Prices and Incomes Board (PPIB), the Nigerian Institute of Social and Economic Research (NISER) and the Federal Ministry of Labour, the first concrete step to ensure the institution of an organized productivity movement in Nigeria was realized in 1978. The conference recommended an organized productivity movement in Nigeria. This recommendation led to the change of name of the Ministry of Labour in 1979 to Ministry of Employment, Labour and Productivity. The year 1979 also saw the launching of the fourth Development Plan, which specifically named increasing productivity in Nigeria as one of its eleven objectives. Consequently, at the inauguration of the National Productivity Committee by the then Hon. Minister of Labour, all the existing states were given directives to establish similar Productivity Committees.

In 1984, the National Productivity Centre was formally inaugurated while the enabling Decree No.7 was promulgated in April, 1987, thus legally establishing the Centre as a Federal parastatal. The history of the Centre will be incomplete without highlighting the roles played by international organizations, such as the International Labour Organistaion (ILO) and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). These organizations provided the technical as well as the financial assistance for the take off of the Centre.

Since its inception, the Centre has considerably developed in size. To fulfill one of its objectives of establishing branches in each State of Nigeria, the Centre has recorded significant progress in creating State Offices proportionate to its financial capabilities. This has helped greatly to facilitate the implementation of its programmes and activities especially at the grassroots level. Between 1988 and 1992 the National Productivity Centre established the six pioneer State Offices located at Bauchi, Ibadan, Kaduna, Lagos, Maiduguri and Owerri. The number increased by four in 1993 with the opening of Benin, Calabar, Makurdi and Sokoto State Offices. At present the Centre has a total of ten States' Offices nationwide.

The Centre’s efforts were recognized in 1993 when it was accorded a research status in recognition of its research efforts. This achievement brought a new condition of service which is commensurate with the new status. The Centre’s salary structure has since changed from Universal Grade levels (UGL) to the Elongated University Salary Scale (EUSS) and now changed to Harmonized Tertiary Institutions Salary Structure (HATISS).