‘S’wakian welders among top talent in O&G’
KUCHING: Sarawakian welders are considered among the best in the oil and gas industry.
This was revealed by Petra Energy Berhad ( PEB) chief executive officer Dato’ Anthony Firdauz Bujang who received feedback on this from oil and gas industry players.
“A lot of people from the oil and gas industry have given me feedback that the best welders in the oil and gas industry usually come from Sarawak.
“So don’t be surprised if you see Sarawakian welders or even riggers and so on in the North Se or in the gulf of Mexico,” he said at the presentation of letters of employment to 40 welding graduates from Centre of Technical Excellence Sarawak ( Centexs) at a leading hotel here yesterday.
The welding graduates were employed by PEB’s wholly owned subsidiary Petra Resources Sdn Bhd, an integrated oil and gas brown field services provider, following its collaborative training programme with Centexs.
Present to witness the presentation of letters were State Secretary Tan Sri Datuk Amar Mohd Morshidi Abdul Ghani, Deputy State Secretary Dr Sabariah Putit and Yayasan Sarawak director Azmi Bujang.
Anthony noted that Petra Resources embarked on this social responsibility programme in 2013 via a collaboration with Yayasan Sarawak with the main objective of giving back to the state through training and developing Sarawakian youths in line with the nation’s goal of ‘ empowering Bumiputera human capital’, a strategy area in the 11th Malaysia Plan to raise the standards of high- skills training and certified professional programmes.
“We realise that one of the ways in which we can give back in a small way is to help improve the income level of our people in Sarawak especially among the youths. We want to create an avenue for them to develop or create jobs where they can earn a higher income.
“The trainees were absorbed after completion of their programme and were able to be placed into our projects,” he said.
Since it started, the programme has trained a total of 157 people to date, with 31 trainees joining the programme this year.
“The trainees undergo three months of theoretical training at Centexs and three months of on-the-job training at any of Petra Resources’ onshore fabrication yards for practical training and exposure. It is during this threemonth stint they are exposed to real work as welders in the oil and gas industry,” Anthony said, adding that upon completion, the qualification obtained would provide the trainees with full mobility within all member countries who recognise the American Welding Society (AWS) and American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) standard.
He also said that despite the major slowdown and current challenges faced by the oil and gas industry, PEB was determined to see this programme through and will continue to invest in training and development as part of the company’s community development initiatives and commitment to the state.
“At PEB, we believe in synergising partnership—the principle of adding value in everything we do. This translates across all our initiatives especially in our social responsibility efforts to develop the communities we operate in.
“The programme is an appropriate fit with our business objectives and also helps ensure the sustainability of welders and talent across the value chain of our service offering,” he said.