Former energy minister sees T&T’s future in Guyana’s oil sector
Former Trinidad and Tobago Minister of Energy Kevin Ramnarine says that his country must position itself to be the logistics hub for Guyana’s booming oil sector and Private Sector Commission (PSC) head Gerry Gouveia says that politicians here have to unite to give Guyanese the tools to provide diverse services or watch the opportunities snatched by other countries.
“We have enough brainpower between our political stakeholders… but if they continue to fight and believe it is only one party that is endowed with the knowledge to help, they will hurt the people,” Gouveia told Stabroek News yesterday.
“The quicker they stop fighting, the better for all of us as a nation…. political stakeholders have to stop fighting each other, because when they are fighting, [other] people will take over,” he added.
According to Trinidad’s Loop News, Ramnarine told a forum that the future of Trinidad and Tobago’s economy depends on its ability to provide port and logistics services for Guyana’s booming oil industry. Ramnarine, according to the report, was speaking at a post-budget session at the University of the West Indies, hosted by the Greater Tunapuna Chamber of Industry and Commerce, the San Juan Business Chamber, and Arima Business Chamber to discuss measures proposed by Trinidad’s Finance Minister Colm Imbert in his recent national budget presentation.
“What I didn’t see mentioned in this budget was, how we are going to strategically position our country to play a role in Guyana?” the Loop quoted Ramnarine as saying.
“All of a sudden you have a country which is poised to become the ‘Abu Dhabi of the Caribbean’. Located a day-and-ahalf’s sailing from Guyana is Trinidad and Tobago, where we have natural deepwater harbours, port infrastructure and so on. Of course, they don’t have that because they have a problem with siltation because of their river systems etc, so we should be positioning this economy to be a port and logistics supply base for Guyana,” he said.
“We were supposed to have a second phase of the Galeota Port… we need to expand the Galeota Port if we are to service Guyana. I think strategically positioning this country to service Guyana and Suriname is critical for diversification,” he said.
Last month, oil major Exxon Mobil announced its 14th major oil discovery here and is on track to begin production next year. The UK-headquartered Tullow Oil has also made two discoveries.
The distance from Exxon Mobil’s offshore operations in the Stabroek Block to Trinidad and Tobago works out to about four times the sailing distance when compared to Georgetown. However, as more companies begin operations and with limited shore base operators to provide necessary services, they will have no choice but to look externally.
Already, a number of companies from Trinidad and Tobago have established businesses here.
Tullow has said that it will shift operations from its Trinidad base to local shores and plans for its first shore base here by next year are in the pipeline.
Gouveia said Ramnarine is wrong that Guyana could not get a deep-water harbour, or meet the demands for port and logistics services. However, he said that this country could see itself in a place of reliance on other nations to provide the services because of the lack of preparedness to meet the skills set and infrastructure required.
The PSC head is of the firm belief that with sound, holistic development plans, this country might only require a fraction of external input.
“Guyana should in fact prepare itself to be, not a cliché of being the breadbasket of the Caribbean again, but a nation that would create employment for our Caribbean brothers and sisters. We must be prepared for that responsibility of being the economic breadbasket. Guyana must be prepared,” he said.
But Gouveia said that Guyana’s policymakers and citizenry must take an inclusionary approach in meeting the demands for the oil and gas sector here and understand that it would not be able to meet all of the needs.
He said that the Caribbean region should be the first external place Guyana turns to when it does not have the capacity to meet demand in the sector.
“We must not be inward looking. Don’t care how bad Trinidad and Tobago would have treated us or how the Bajans would have treated us, we must not get involved in a ‘do for do’. We must be bigger than that. We must look at ways to create jobs and so on,” he said.
“In terms of that country benefitting from Guyana’s oil wealth and future, I don’t know why he thinks we can’t have a deep-water harbour because he is very wrong. We will get a deep-water harbour and we will get linking roads to Brazil… but I am saying Guyana’s prosperity will be more than enough to accommodate the Caribbean,” he added.
The investment focus must be on positioning Guyanese to meet the demands that will arise when this country becomes an oil producing nation, according to Gouveia, who said that the private sector also has a role to pay. “The private sector, our local entrepreneur and businesses have to be equipped to take up that responsibility. If there are shortfalls, nothing is wrong with welcoming first our brothers and sisters from CARICOM but we must be a case where we know it is coming,” he said.
Last year September, Guyana and Trinidad inked a long-awaited Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on Energy Sector Cooperation with the leaders of both countries assuring that there is no need to fear any “takeover” of the energy sector by either side.
“There is nothing in the MoU which seeks to harm the interest of one state or the other. There is no sellout. There were some unjustified fears that Guyana is giving away the family jewels but that is not true. It is simply a means of collaborating,” President David Granger had said at the signing.
T&T Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley said that specific teams from both countries will work on specific projects and problems to either initiate, ameliorate or generate the kinds of outcome to contribute to the growth of the economies and the sustenance of the peoples of both countries.