By Basssey Williams, Reporting From Yenagoa.
The Minister of State Petroleum Resources, HMSPR, Chief Timipre Sylva, has tasked African-oil producing countries under the African Petroleum Producers Organisation, APPO, on the need to develop their local content legislations so as to optimally maximize the benefits of the oil and gas sector.
Sylva stated this at the maiden virtual 1st African Local Content Roundtable, for APPO countries, held at the Nigerian Content Development and Monitoring Board, NCDMB, Towers in Yenagoa, Bayelsa State.The Roundtable had in attendance representatives of fifteen African oil producing country members of APPO.
According to the HMSPR, any country that aspires to achieve rapid and sustainable economic growth must put in place an economic model that enables its human capital to harness its natural resources to create wealth and economic prosperity.
He explained that Nigeria embraced this model by adopting local content as an economic development model for the oil and sector, in view of its abundant hydrocarbon resources estimated at 37 Billion barrels of crude oil and 202 TCF of gas reserves.
The HMSPR pointed out that the objective of the pan-African Roundtable is to institutionalize peer review mechanism among Oil-producing countries on local content as a key development imperative for domestication and sustainable growth of Africa’s hydrocarbon resources
His words: “We define local content as value added to or created in the Nigerian economy by a systematic development of capacity and capabilities, through deliberate utilization of Nigerian services, human and material resources in the Nigerian oil and gas industry.
“Through implementation of local content we have achieved significant growth in-country value addition from less than 5% in 2010 to 35% in 2021 and we have set an ambitious target to achieve 70% local content in the oil and gas sector by 2027.
“Our success story in the oil and gas industry has led to bold step to extend local content to other sectors of the Nigerian economy. As a caring African country, we have also considered it necessary to amplify the benefits of local content to our fellow African countries and that is the essence of the African Local Content Roundtable.”
He commend the NCDMB for initiating this Roundtable, noting that by this effort, NCDMB has set the pace as the premier Local Content regulator in Africa and a worthy example to sister nations that seek guidance to institutionalize Local Content practices in their jurisdictions.
“We must therefore use the opportunity of this RoundTable to initiate conversations around Local Content, share success stories, challenges and come up with policies that would deepen local participation and domiciliation in our respective countries.
“One of the pathways for this desired collaboration and cross-country development is the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) and I am pleased that we have a representative of AfCFTA in this forum.
“Indeed, AfCFTA provides an opportunity to create a single market through the facilitation of free movement of goods, services and investment within the 54 member states of the Continent, creating access to 1.2 billion customers, with a cumulative Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of over US$3.4 trillion.
“It is imperative that African oil-producing countries and their companies cooperate closely in developing and sharing capacities and capabilities to optimize the hydrocarbon deposits and achieve economic growth and development,” Sylva stated.
In his remarks, the Executive Secretary, NCDMB, Engr. Simbi Wabote, said Africa needs to start discussion on how they can use their Hydrocarbon resources to migrate into renewable energy, adding that NCDMB as a leader in the development of local content in the oil and gas sector in Africa decided to bring all African oil producers together for discussion.
He said, “I think its time for African to begin to come together on how to use their resources to migrate into a renewable one. The discussion is about climate change which we believe is somehow renewable and that has become topic all over the world.
“With the threat of the climate change, what it portend for Africa is that very soon the natural resources that the continent has not even tapped will not be useful anymore. Therefore we need to start the discussion on how we can use our hydrocarbons resources to migrate into a renewable energy. That is very important to us.
“We have so many African countries that have come to jaw-jaw with us to learn the strategy on how to develop local content in the hydrocarbon sector. For us we feel we are the leader in that sector, we need to bring other African countries together in other to develop the local content since for them they are just discovering hydrocarbon resources and the discussion is how to migrate into renewable energy.”
Also in his remarks, the Secretary General of APPO, Mr. Omar Farouk Ibrahim, said the timing of the African Local Content Roundtable is imperative considering the threats posed to the oil and gas industry by renewal energy.
Stressing the need for collaboration and partnership among APPO member countries, he acknowledged that restoring bilateral understanding among African countries was pertinent in this regard, adding that what has been missing is a continent wide initiative such as the African Local Content Roundtable.
