Over the past six and half decades of our post-colonial history, Nigeria has developed hundreds of policies, and established ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) to help realize the objectives of our leaders in the formulation of those policies and visions. Unfortunately, most of Nigeria’s departments and agencies rather than transform from the infancy state of their formation into independent agencies driving the engine of growth in the economy, remained at their infancy and are annoyingly poised to continue to receive annual subventions from the lean government resources, as if the agencies exists solely to receive government subventions and not more. It is with this background that I will attempt to highlight the laudable opportunities behind the visions of the Petroleum Technology Trust Fund (PTDF), and critically x-ray the modest accomplishments it has made, while highlighting what is missing with a view to offer a new direction for consideration by the management and board of the PTDF. Indeed, my choice of PTDF is because of my long working experience spanning over three decades in the petroleum industry. I estimate that there are similar issues in the other MDAs.
The mandate of PTDF as elegantly stated in their website is “Building Capacities and Capabilities in Nigeria’s Oil and Gas Industry through the development of Human Capacities, Institutional Capacity Development as well as the promotion of Research and Acquisition of relevant technologies”. These are very important objectives aptly articulated and it goes beyond the immediate prescription of the PTDF Act of 1973 by recognising Institutional Capacity Development as a potential pillar for the accomplishment of the objectives of PTDF. A further look at the vision described in the website revealed a grand vision: “To serve not only as a vessel for the development of indigenous manpower and technology transfer/acquisition in the oil and gas industry but to make Nigeria a human resource centre for the West African sub-region and the Gulf of Guinea.”
On a positive note, is the visible collaboration of PTDF with key industry stakeholders and pressure groups. While delivering the keynote address at the 4th PENGASSAN Energy and Labour Summit in Abuja, the executive secretary of PTDF reeled out some of the accomplishments of PTDF as the training of 15,000 Nigerians through scholarships, the certification of over 1,700 welders, and the upgrade of 26 universities and 214 ICT centres nationwide. These appear laudable accomplishments but it calls for a deeper reflection to avoid being pulled into confusing activities with progress. More questions need to be asked around the deployment of the trained manpower in the industry and how sustainable the processes of PTDF training has been.
Performance assessment and implementation gaps
I am an apostle of honest Self-Assessments for individuals and/or groups in managing their performances but where there is brutal feedback available from customers, every self-assessment need moderation and it is in this regard I suggest we move beyond the shibboleths of self-adulation to realign our assessment for better efficiencies and strategic accomplishments. The reality check was provided recently by Dangote Refinery which stated that they got over 10,000 welders from India whereas they struggled to get about 100 Nigerian welders for their project that spanned several years.
The issues around the scanty deployment of Nigerian welders, as is with other skill areas, to one of the largest projects ever embarked in Nigeria (Africa), a trend that is also similar for the other projects in the Nigerian petroleum industry, speaks to the need for a strategic shift in the deployment of PTDF resources and development approach. There is a fundamental need to focus on growing the “needed skills” and not just enrolling for generic training for PTDF to be relevant. If PTDF that has existed for over 50 years with the humongous resources at its disposal cannot contribute one percent of the critical workforce in the industry it serves, then it is obvious there are a number of strategic mis-alignment in both the scope and execution of PTDF priorities.
Furthermore management measurement metrics (leading and lagging key performance indicators) that could have helped dissect the extent of deployment of the large pool of personnel trained by PTDF is not immediately (readily) available and these are essential in assessing the value derived from PTDF investments such as in number of expatriate positions eliminated in Nigeria because locals have been adequately qualified to replace the expats. These are tangible measures of accomplishment of PTDF objectives and which are currently not tracked. The implication is that activities of PTDF are not being improved in a structured manner driven by data/information.
A further review of the tie between PTDF activities and the Nigerian local content development board (another agency of the federal government), and PTDF direct interactions with the key Petroleum Industry Operators (other than the NNPC) at operational levels did not show much congruence in the planning of the training activities of PTDF from identified industry gaps as experienced by operators. PTDF has focused mostly on university education (which are by all means desirable) as opposed to the industry specific needs which are more direct in application to the petroleum industry, are often multidisciplinary in nature and oftentimes a further extension of the University Training.
Considering that the petroleum industry skills often exceed the requirements of most other industries because of the high safety exposures, an appropriately trained professional in the petroleum industry will most likely qualify for other industries but the reverse is often not the case. Dangote Refinery in another statement described the amount of extra training it gave its Nigerian employees to be able to function in their roles and this is typical of the experience of most operators. These statements highlight the need for PTDF to align its training programmes to the strategic needs of the industry operators and not just the generic training typical of what is offered in the universities.
The integration of the PTDF strategic objectives with industry will not be complete until a parallel is drawn between the industrial activities in other petroleum producing and consuming countries and Nigeria to understand where we could further utilize our petroleum and industrial resources. An example is in various fields of metallurgy where our flared gas could have provided the investment incentive to integrate new investment in metallurgy as in Indonesia, Russia, etc., and in so doing boost our gross national products. The PTDF is most suited to explore these frontier technologies, using examples in other countries, working with other government agencies to convert our petroleum industry waste to wealth. This is a major shift away from just by asking focused petroleum industry operators to pay penalties for flares, as an example. This type of opportunity harvest is possible when PTDF integrates more with the Operators and Industry.
A cursory look at the industry bodies that are involved in development of manpower and technology in the Nigerian petroleum industry compared with the United States’ where the American Petroleum Institute (API) has a pre-eminent role, reveals multiple agencies such as the Nigerian Content Development Board NCDB, the Federal University of Petroleum Effurun near Warri formerly called Petroleum Training Institute (PTI), the PTDF, regulatory bodies like the upstream and midstream of the Petroleum industry — NUPRC /NMDPRA; Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON), etc. This would have meant accelerated development of Nigerian manpower if this was the right strategy but unfortunately may have created the unintended gaps in expectations and execution. As they say, multiple cooks can spoil the soup, especially where roles and expectations tend to overlap. It is possible that the lack of single point responsibility and accountability could be blurring in the cost-effective and sustainable development of Nigerian resources in the petroleum industry. There is a need for clearly defined interfaces for agencies with overlapping functions for effectiveness and the sustainable accomplishment of the [PTDF] development objectives.
Conclusion
In conclusion, the priorities of PTDF in enlisting Nigerians for training programmes has been pursued with strong determination. However, mere attendance of training does not necessarily bridge skills gaps so trained personnel should be given opportunities to put the newly acquired skills to use. Training should therefore be tailored towards specific needs and these are typically jointly determined with operators. There is a need to create a balance towards more effective and sustainable training programmes tailored to meet the specific structured skills and skill gaps of the petroleum industry as determined jointly with operators while balancing this with university training programmes.
Making training programmes suited and more focused towards specific industry needs and stewarding the related value based leading and lagging indicators ensures high value is derived from PTDF activities in areas such as expatriate workforce reduction (down to diversity needs only) and even export of our manpower to other parts of the world. These are significant value propositions worthy of the visions of our founding leaders. Also, through more integration with the industry, solutions to key industry challenges especially in frontier technology areas could be explored, drawing lessons from other parts of the world to grow petroleum and allied industries and skills which are typically outside the focus of industry operators. To be able to clearly steward these objectives, there is a need for more inter-agency interactions to clarify roles and accountabilities and avoid duplications.
James Nwagbogwu Ebede, a mechanical engineer and distinguished best-graduating student of the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, is an international oil and gas executive with over three decades of experience spanning Shell, ExxonMobil and independent consulting, and has led major upstream production, asset development and operations in Nigeria and Iraq. He is the managing director of Unique Drills Limited and a former senior operations and projects leader at ExxonMobil, where he managed large multidisciplinary teams, complex terminal and offshore facilities, and major brownfield and greenfield projects, while championing technology deployment, training and competency development for operations and maintenance personnel. He has a strong track record in asset redevelopment, systems completion and start-up, decommissioning studies, and community and infrastructure projects. He can be reached via comment@businessamlive.com
