The government has embarked on measures to reform the fiscal regime in the oil and gas sector to safeguard it from the looming energy transition and threats it poses to investment in the industry.

The Director of Local Content at the Petroleum Commission, Kweku Boateng, who made this known, said given the potential in the sector, there were concerns that if the country did not make an effort to attract investment, some of its hydrocarbon resources could be stranded.

Mr Boateng, who was speaking during a presentation at the Third Africa Energy summit in Accra yesterday, however, said the nation had made efforts to ensure its fiscal regime remained attractive.

“We are looking at capitalising our acreages with tailor made terms, but one challenge is that, it is one size fits all. “We want to look at the risk of the blocks, the potential reserves of the blocks and the water dearth of the blocks to determine the fiscals that will be applied to the blocks,” he added.

Summit

The summit, which was on the theme: “Africa and the new world energy order,” was organised by Offshore Africa, a player in the oil and gas industry on the continent. Some of the topics discussed included what it takes to succeed as an indigenous oil and gas company in Africa, the strategic pathway to attracting more oil and gas investments and the current state of play in the nation’s gas sector.

A Deputy Minister of Energy, John Kobina Aboah Sanie, said the transformative policies were aimed at changing the narrative of the country’s energy sector by drawing up and implementing robust local content and other initiatives.

He said such policies would help build local capacity, enhance skills and also ensure that the energy resources contribute more significantly to economic development.

Training

Mr Sanie further said that more than 10 tutors from various technical universities in the country had been trained in welding and fabrication, pipe fitting and electrical and mechanical engineering to build their capacity in the oil and gas industry.

He also said that a welding bureau institution had also been set up to equip indigenes on international specifications, welding fabrications and vital skills in the petroleum upstream sector.

Mr Sanie said although the industry was still facing some challenges, the general state of the nation’s petroleum sector was positive. Currently, Mr Sanie added, 14 petroleum agreements were in existence with three producing fields and about 150,000 barrels of oil produced daily.

He said plans were underway to construct a second gas plant, while a comprehensive review of the gas master plan was also ongoing.