Guyanese benefitted from almost GY$19 billion in oil and gas contracts during first half of 2021

A worker demonstrates the steel cutting process at the Guyana Oil & Gas Support Services (GOGSSI) factory. GOGSSI is one of two local firms providing fabrication services for the Prosperity FPSO, Guyana’s 3rd oil production vessel.

During the first half of 2021, ExxonMobil Guyana and its contractors spent nearly GY$19 billion with more than 750 Guyanese vendors on goods and services ranging from food stuff to engineering. This has generated, either directly or indirectly, an economic impact of GY$23.1 billion and increased the total spent on local businesses to $96.4 billion since 2015.

The company said in an activity update on Monday that these figures show an almost $5 billion increase for the same period in 2020, despite the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Outreach to local businesses continued through the Centre for Local Business Development with 141 electronic tender notifications being issued to over 3,000 Guyanese companies and mentoring seven Guyanese companies to be compliant in ISO 9001,” ExxonMobil noted.

Employee statistics also show an increase in local hires for the sector, with a 38 percent growth.

“As of June 2021, 2,865 Guyanese were supporting the company’s overall activities, representing 53% of the total workforce. The Guyanese workforce grew by 38% to 2,865 at the end of June 2021 from 2,070 in June 2020 – and includes 568 women,” the company stated.

Furthermore, over 82,000 hours of training were provided to Guyanese staff working on ExxonMobil Guyana activities, with more than 85 percent being in Professional, Technical and Craft, and Trade training areas.

Commenting on the company’s pursuit of local content development and utilisation, President of ExxonMobil Guyana, Alistair Routledge, said the company is proud of the local content results and will continue its local capacity-building efforts.  “It is important to identify and invest in successive projects that allow for the expansion of efficient operations to provide sustainable employment opportunities, local business growth and broader economic development across Guyana,” he stated.

ExxonMobil Guyana is currently undertaking production in the Liza 1 field offshore Guyana, and Liza 2 is expected to come on stream next year. This will be followed by the startup of the Payara and Yellowtail fields.