Nigeria has been trying to induce industrialization with the aim reducing poverty since its First National Development Plan of 1962/68 but has nevertheless retrogressed from being a middle income country in the 1970s to the poverty capital of the world in 2018. This poor economic performance calls for introspection. Drawing from the early canons of economic thought and from the history of industrial evolution, it is observed that poverty reduction comes from wealth creation which is intricately dependent on the capital goods sector. This stems from the fact that the sector is responsible for operationalizing inventions and innovations, perfecting the designs and production of all the machines and equipment that are in turn used for the production of all other machines - computers, robotics, 3-D Printing, AI and other emerging technologies – and the development of technological capability in the economy. Just like the woman’s womb, the capital goods sector is the reproductive centre of the economy par excellence and the progenitor of all other industrial products. Thus, without a dynamic indigenous capital goods sector, the economy is technically ‘barren’ or in a stationery state. Unfortunately, this ubiquitous sector is absent in Nigeria and many less developed countries because their policy makers prioritize the finished products of industry over capital goods and technological capability which ensure the continuous birthing of new life-changing products that define our civilization and constitute the true novelty of industrialization. The nexus between the capital goods sector and the development of technological capability is demonstrated by focusing on technological learning-by-doing and technological entrepreneurship. It is argued that a populous country and a major oil exporter like Nigeria has the potential to satisfy the first two preconditions for the viability of the strategy - availability of investment capital and absorptive capacity. However, to invoke the cycle of indigenous industrial revolution, policies that will incentivize local and foreign organizations to invest in the capital goods sector (perhaps the most limiting precondition) must be put in place and the economic drivers must also intelligently actuate the creative destruction and or the reinvention of the socio-economic and institutional factors militating against economic development.

KEYWORDS:Capital Goods Sector; Technological Capability; Wealth Creation; Technological Entrepreneurship; Technological Learning-By-Doing