Prime Minister, Mark Phillips, on Tuesday that Guyanese must benefit from the country’s success. Phillips stressed that the main objective of his Government is to enhance the lives of all Guyanese.
“In every country’s success, its people must be involved. Its people must be able to feel the success as their own and reap the benefits of that success. Ownership and inclusion of a country’s people are imperative not only for the country’s development but for the social and economic betterment of citizens,” PM Phillips said. The Prime Minister made these comments at the opening ceremony of the TechnipFMC Georgetown service base oil and gas support facility at Mc Doom, East Bank Demerara.
PM Phillips disclosed that the Government is resolved in its commitment to ensuring that the economic prosperity of the country is the economic prosperity of the society. As such, he explained that his Government has legislated and is now enforcing, local content laws.
Phillips said that this legislation, will also tremendously benefit locally-owned businesses by giving them an opportunity to grow and increase capacity. “Consider the simple example of the construction for this facility. Its impressive design came at the hands of a local company with supervision by the TechnipFMC team. This is a commendable achievement that increases the competitiveness of that company and gives it a winning chance at success in its future endeavours. These are the partnerships that will help to propel our citizens to prosperity as our country develops,” he noted.
The Prime Minister explained that he is particularly pleased at the upskilling of the local labour force through the transfer of knowledge and expertise. “TechnipFMC’s Guyana-led workforce at this location has undergone international-standard training and is now highly equipped and marketable in the fields in which the employees specialise. Such partnerships showcase the benefit that additional jobs for local professionals and businesses have on the local workforce, who profit from increased skills training and diversification in the high-demand industry of oil and gas,” Phillips said.
President of TechnipFMC, Jon Landes said that the company continues to recruit and train Guyanese. “We are committed to continuing our development in Guyana and developing our Guyanese talent, in addition, we have over 70 local suppliers that we’ve developed,” Landes explained.
Meanwhile, President of ExxonMobil Guyana, Alistair Routledge said that since the first discovery of oil in the country seven years ago, the industry has grown tremendously with an investment approaching US$30b by ExxonMobil. “We’re committed to developing the local content so that the people of Guyana benefit not just from the revenues of oil and gas, but also from the investment that’s taking place,” Routledge assured.
Prime Minister Phillips, Natural Resources Minister, Vickram Bharrat, Routledge and other invited guests, were taken on a guided tour of the facility after the short ceremony to officially declare the 10-acre facility open.
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