Page 5 - LatAmOil Week 17 2022

LatAmOil COMMENTARY LatAmOil

Guyana’s Prime Minister Mark Phillips, a industry and was not owning up to its mistakes.
retired brigadier, also spoke positively, saying: “I don’t know if they have a problem with
“I look forward to more developments that will truth, but the fact of the matter is that the econ-
come from these and other shows of commit- omy is undiversified and it relies heavily on oil
ment to Guyana’s future growth and economic and gas,” he was quoted as saying by OilNOW.
well-being.” gy. “And when the prices fall, things start to fall
But the commissioning ceremony was not apart, and they are facing some of those conse-
just a happy corporate milestone to be marked quences now.”
with upbeat statements and positive PR. It also In the meantime, there are other underlying
marked a geographic shift – and may serve as a issues at work. Jagdeo was speaking shortly after
reminder that political tensions can surface as Ramesh Dookhoo of the Guyana Manufactur-
one hydrocarbon province matures and another ing and Services Association (GMSA) answered
comes to the forefront. questions about his own country’s local-content
policies by reiterating a long-standing complaint
Geographic shift about honey transshipment policies in Trinidad
The shift in question involves TechnipFMC’s and Tobago.
decision to move operations previously carried Addressing Mahindra Ramesh Ramdeen,
out from a facility in Trinidad and Tobago to the CEO of the Trinidad & Tobago Manufac-
its new base on the East Bank of the Demerara turers’ Association, at an event in Georgetown,
river. Landes made note of the change, saying Dookhoo said: “We will respect Trinidad’s pri- Relations
the company had now “successfully transferred vate sector more when you advocate some of
all activities done in Trinidad to Guyana.” the things that bother us, like your illegal honey between Trinidad
Routledge indicated that he saw the move to legislation, which is on the books and going on
Guyana as a positive development, remarking for years and years and years.” and Tobago and
that ExxonMobil had previously been forced to Guyana predate
rely “heavily” on established facilities in Trinidad Frontier vs. mature fields
and Tobago. He called TechnipFMC’s expansion The spat over honey transshipments is, of course, the discovery of
project a “shining example” of Guyana’s push to not directly relevant to the oil and gas sector.
improve and expand its infrastructure networks. However, it does raise important points. It hydrocarbons in
These remarks were probably well received serves as a reminder that relations between Trin-
in Georgetown, which has been working hard to idad and Tobago and Guyana predate (and are either country
ensure that the country’s burgeoning oil indus- not dependent on) the discovery of hydrocar- and are not
try has strong local-content and job-creation bons in either country and that those relations
components – that it has a distinct Guyanese are not always smooth. always smooth
flavour, that is. But they were probably greeted It also highlights the fact that these tensions
less warmly in Port of Spain, where govern- can surface at times when industries that are
ment officials have spoken repeatedly about important to the local economy, such as oilfield
the readiness of Trinidad and Tobago’s oilfield services, decide to scale down operations in
service providers (OSPs) to support operations one place and ramp them up in another. These
in Guyana, Suriname and other locations in and tensions may become more noticeable in the
around the eastern Caribbean Sea. (The island coming years as new service bases are built in
state is home to many such companies, most of Guyana (and in neighbouring Suriname as
them built up to support local onshore and off- well), a frontier hydrocarbon province, espe-
shore natural gas production.) cially if OSP activity slows down in Trinidad
and Tobago, where many fields are maturing. ™
Underlying considerations
For parties such as ExxonMobil, meanwhile,
the location of service bases is a matter of
practicality.
While it may have made sense to work out of
facilities in Trinidad and Tobago several years
ago, before production began at Stabroek, it
is probably more economical to work out of a
closer facility on the Guyanese coast now that
drilling and other marine service operations
at the block are more extensive. As such, Rou-
tledge’s talk of being forced to rely “heavily” on
bases in Trinidad and Tobago may be more of a
comment on geographic distance than a com-
plaint about that country per se.Nevertheless,
such remarks can sting when they come in the
wake of other criticism – and there has been
some criticism coming from Guyana’s direction
lately. In late March, for example, Guyana’s Vice
President Bharrat Jagdeo alleged that Trinidad
and Tobago had not done enough to protect
itself from over-dependence on the oil and gas Guyanese employee of TechnipFMC, shown at event in 2019 (Photo: TechnipFMC)

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