-VP Jagdeo

GUYANA’S Vice President Dr. Bharrat Jagdeo has disclosed that monitoring and contract compliance will be among the major policy items for the country’s oil and gas (O&G) sector in 2024.

Dr. Jagdeo during his weekly news conference at the Office of the President, on Thursday, maintained that the government remains committed to improving its policies to regulate the country growing oil and gas industry.

In fact, the VP told reporters that the government has already implemented several policies that were outlined in its manifesto.

These according to Dr. Jagdeo include: reforming the Natural Resource Fund, reforming the petroleum activities bill, local content legislation, process safety event (PSE) strengthening the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the environmental permits.

“We believe this year has to focus more on greater monitoring and contract compliance. So the new law would necessitate and clarify data flow between companies so we will now focus heavily on timeliness of data, the completeness of data, and the assessment of the data when it comes from the oil companies,” Dr. Jagdeo said.

Further, the Vice President disclosed that a complete review of the country’s local content legislation is on the cards.

“The local content law, we are now doing complete review to see what worked, what didn’t work, what was effective, what was not effective, the loopholes that were exploited in the law and then we have to make adjustments accordingly.”
Last year, Attorney-General and Minister of Legal Affairs Anil Nandlall had disclosed that officials would update its local content laws to reflect the learnings and recommendations from stakeholders in the growing industry.

On December 31, 2021, the Government of Guyana passed the Local Content Act 2021. Subsequently, it published several related guidelines that were designed to maximise the participation of Guyanese companies wherever they have the skills and capacity to get involved, beginning with services such as office space rental, janitorial services, laundry and catering services, pest control services, insurance services, supply of food and accounting services and extending through long-term involvement in highly skilled subsectors like subsea installation, geophysical analysis and engineering.

The Local Content Act was designed with the overarching goal that Guyana’s oil and gas industry will support an economy where small and medium-sized businesses can grow, thrive, and benefit from those resources.

This publication had previously reported that small and medium-scale businesses operating in the field of logistics and transportation have been benefitting significantly from the oil and gas sector.

Senior Petroleum Coordinator at the Ministry of Natural Resources, Bobby Gossai Jr. had said:
“We have seen the growth in the establishment of more infrastructure, support, and the service sector. We have seen major businesses that have been established, we have seen the establishment of the Local Content Secretariat and the approval of Local Content Certificates.”