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Principal and Chief Executive of the Petroleum Training Institute (PTI), Dr Henry Adebowale Adimula, says the institute has graduated no fewer than 50, 000 technologists, technicians and other technical personnel in various areas of oil and gas and allied industries.
He made the disclosure at a World Press Conference held on Friday at the institute’s Council Chambers, Effurun, Uvwie Local Government Area of Delta State as part of activities marking the 50th anniversary of the institution.
He said the institute, established in 1972, besides achieving 100 per cent of its mandate, has churned out quality graduates that are the most preferred choices for employment in the oil and gas sector across the globe.
According to him, in line with the local content policy on manpower development, the institute’s effort has yielded positive results where expatriate technicians working in the petroleum industry are now being replaced by trained indigenous technicians
Dr Adimula, therefore, urged captains of the oil and gas industry to visit the institute’s state-of-the-art facilities with a huge potential to offer training in all aspects of petroleum industry operations.
“I urge the captains of the oil industries to come and take a tour of our exceptional facilities that have huge potential for offering training in all aspects of Petroleum industry operations.
“These facilities should serve as a platform for domesticating training in the industry and thus saving vital foreign exchange for the nation’s economy,” Adimula noted.
He lauded past and present executives of the Petroleum Technology Development Fund (PTDF) for the infrastructural upgrade of the institution.
He said this has positioned the institute as the only one in sub-Sahara Africa with the facilities that can address the contemporary training needs of oil and gas workers in Africa.
Dr Adimula added that the next 50 years of the institute will be a period of redefinition in the delivery of training solutions, research and development.
He, therefore, made a wake-up call to Oil and Gas institutions to engage in research that will tackle Africa’s challenges on energy.
He urged Africans not to take hurried steps in abandoning fossil fuels, but to make research and expand local technologies to meet the high global demand for fossil fuels.
“As the world grapples with energy transition from the exploitation and utilization of fossil fuels to cleaner and more environmentally friendly sources of energy, the Petroleum Training Institute has taken a bold stride in kick-starting research and development efforts that takes cognisance of the peculiarity of the Africa situation.
“With an estimated 125 Billion barrels of crude reserves and over 600tcf of gas reserves in Africa, it is our considered opinion that Africa should not hasten to abandon fossil fuel but should strive to deepen research and development of local technologies that enable the exploitation and beneficiation of our oil and gas endowment in a more environmentally friendly manner as the reality of global demand for fossil fuel is expected to linger for the next 50 years.
“Today, we are confronted with the grim reality that only a few African countries have been able to master certain aspects of oil production technology but none can research, design and fabricate key machinery for the industry.
“Thus the Institute intends to focus research in this key area in order to develop local content capacity in oil technology to enable our country to achieve some independence in the design and production of technology for the oil industry.
“This endeavour is all the more critical since the foreign expertise we solely rely on for our oil and gas potential has developed a sudden apathy for the exploitation of the hydrocarbons in the wake of the allurement of the energy transmission.
“This serves as a wake-up call for our indigenous Institutes to engage in research in order to develop local production technology in the oil and gas industry to address Africa’s perennial challenges of poverty and energy shortages,” he said.
Meanwhile, the PTI’s 50th-anniversary celebration begins on October 13, 2022, with a one-day conference and award night at the PTDF hall in Abuja continuing from October 21 and culminating in the institute’s convocation ceremony on October 29, 2022.
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