NURPC Chief Executive, Gbenga Komolafe, stated this when he
played host to the Executive Secretary of the Nigerian Content Development and
Monitoring Board, Felix Ogbe, in his office on Tuesday.
Komolafe had disclosed that the Nigerian upstream sector is
“facing severe pressures because of the low crude oil production and lack of
investment in recent years.”
According to him, the energy map of the world had changed
considerably with the emergence of several new oil-producing countries.
This situation, he said, had induced a high level of
competitiveness for investment capital, stressing that strategic actions must
be taken to make the Nigerian environment investor-friendly.
“We must vacate entry barriers for investment. This is
common logic when there is high competition. We need to work together to lower
barriers and do everything possible to motivate investment,” a statement from
the NCDMB on Wednesday quoted Komolafe as saying.
He assured that the NUPRC would partner closely with the
NCDMB to achieve some of the programmes it had planned for 2024.
In his words, the NCDMB reiterated the need for teamwork and
partnership among various agencies under the Ministry of Petroleum Resources,
to sustain the growth of the Nigerian oil and gas industry.
Ogbe hinted that collaboration would create an enabling
environment that would attract investments and new projects into the sector,
helping to create employment opportunities for youths and address insecurity in
the polity.
While noting that local content development would be stunted
if projects and investments in the oil and gas sector did not flourish, he
suggested that the two agencies should organise workshops to examine and
resolve concerns identified by investors as obstacles to investments and new
projects.
He hinted that investment decisions by international oil and
gas companies are often affected by their assessment of their Return on
Investments.
Ogbe also visited the National Insurance Commission, Sunday
Thomas, whom he promised that the board would work closely with NAICOM to
review and operationalise the insurance services regulations jointly issued by
both agencies in June 2022, to get Nigerian oil and gas companies to patronise
local insurance firms.
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