The Petroleum Technology Development Fund (PTDF) on Tuesday in Abuja called on oil companies operating in Nigeria to employ Nigerian professionals who passed through PTDF capacity building programmes.
A statement issued by Head, Press and External Relations of PTDF, Mr Kalu Otisi, said the employment of Nigerians would help in the development of the nation’s oil and gas sector.
The statement quoted the Executive Secretary of PTDF, Mr Femi Ajayi, as saying that 90 per cent of Nigerian oil was produced by Joint Venture Companies (JVC).
The Petroleum Technology Development Fund (PTDF) on Tuesday in Abuja called on oil companies operating in Nigeria to employ Nigerian professionals who passed through PTDF capacity building programmes.
A statement issued by Head, Press and External Relations of PTDF, Mr Kalu Otisi, said the employment of Nigerians would help in the development of the nation’s oil and gas sector.
The statement quoted the Executive Secretary of PTDF, Mr Femi Ajayi, as saying that 90 per cent of Nigerian oil was produced by Joint Venture Companies (JVC).
The Federal Government equity share in the project is 60 per cent, while 40 per cent is for the International oil companies (IOC), the statement noted.
Ajayi said it was important to have Nigerian professionals dominating the sector since the country had the larger share of JVC.
He said PTDF spent huge sums in manpower development through research and training of Nigerians in engineering, geology, geosciences, management, economics and relevant fields in the petroleum and solid mineral sectors.
“If we put so much money in training these people and they don’t have any value domestically, it means that we are spending without getting result.
“We need political will to compel oil companies to employ our trained professionals to work in the sector.
“We don’t need to wait for them to do that, they need to be compelled to do so,’’ Ajayi said.
He said that by so doing, government would be getting value for the money spent in training, research and development.
The statement said in a bid to promote capacity, PTDF had also pioneered a competition on a research grant.
It said that the competition, initiated in 2008 with five awardees selected from over 100 research proposals, had been peer reviewed.
It said the second phase of the programme recorded breakthroughs leading to three intellectual property rights and patent certificates.
The statement said that three out of the five topics in the third phase had shown high prospects of securing intellectual property rights and patents in the coming months, having been found to be commercially viable.
“The third topic on development of Novel Technology for diagnosing and remediating problems associated with oil field, reservoir sourcing and corrosion in the petroleum industry has proved to have economic significance.
“This year’s close-out session is a celebration of excellence and success story.
“Five outstanding researches are being concluded and these researches are found to be commercially viable.
“The fund has therefore put in place actions to file for intellectual rights and patency at the Ministry of Industry, Trade and Investment,’’ the statement said.
Meanwhile, the Co-ordinator, Nigeria’s Honorary International Investor Council, Baroness Linda Chalker, has said that the mandate of PTDF in building capacity for oil and gas industry is critical to the survival of the industry.
“Unless you build capacity you would not get the best out of your industry and it doesn’t matter whether it is in the oil industry or any other industry.
“Capacity building helps government to make better use of their resources,” the statement quoted Chalker as saying.
Chalker said that for such trainings to be meaningful and sustainable, trainees must be effectively engaged and made to practice the skills they acquired in the course of their training.
She, however, advised PTDF to adopt dialogue with JVC partner oil firms in respect of the employment of Nigerians.
“You need to know if the IOCs value the training you are giving as appropriate to their needs to fill their skills gaps.
“Unless you do that, and you don’t do it just once off, you have to repeat it and update it to make sure the training you are giving is what the customer wants,’’Chalker said in the statement.
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