State actors have been urged to share petroleum information to ensure that Ghana is not short changed. The call was made by CEO of the Petroleum Commission, Egbert Faibille Jnr., when he addressed a virtual dialogue on extractive governance in Ghana as a keynote speaker yesterday.
According to Mr. Faibille Jnr., weak institutional collaboration in the sector has in the past manifested itself in weak geological data gathering, poor revenue collection and cost oversight as well as a lack of proper integration of the oil and gas sector in the larger economy. He said, if proper collaboration is ensured, Ghana will achieve higher levels of transparency and accountability in the sector.
In his view, with the consolidation of the existing policy and regulatory framework, effective collaboration, and the necessary vigilance on the part of stakeholders, our hydrocarbon resource will be a blessing rather than a curse.
“As we continue production and deplete our resources, we need to accelerate investments to continually replace our reserves. This is the only way we can ensure that the oil and gas industry is sustainable. This requires measures to attract investments into the sector”. He further noted.
The two-day dialogue which ends today is on the theme “Towards a Sustainable future for Extractive Governance in Ghana- Interrogating past reforms for exploring new policy directions” and is being organised by the Natural Resource Governance Institute (NRGI), in collaboration with the Africa Centre for Energy Policy (ACEP), the Ghana Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (GHEITI) and the Public Interest and Accountability Committee (PIAC).
Discussions are centering on how extractive policy communities can drive thought leadership to better redefine the direction of Ghana’s extractive policy. Experts are expected to analyse the direction of Ghana’s mining sector after over a century as well as the oil and gas industry, ten years after oil production. The successes and low points will be highlighted which will be the basis for going forward as a country.
Source: Petroleum Commission