Most direct jobs at the Venus oil and gas project will go to highly-specialised foreign workers, according to the project’s Environmental and Social Impact Assessment (Esia) report.
The final Esia report was submitted to the Ministry of Environment and Tourism and released to the public last Monday by SLR Consulting.
“Realistically it is clear that the vast majority of offshore employment related to the drilling campaign, the installation of subsea infrastructure, the operation of the floating production storage and offloading [facility] will comprise highly specialised and skilled staff which will in all probability be international crews,” the report reads.
Although the Esia estimates that 2 500 jobs will be created during the construction phase of the project, only 500 will be direct jobs, which all require skills not currently present in Namibia.
A further 2 000 jobs will be indirectly created at companies that support oil and gas projects.
Of those indirect jobs, Namibia currently can supply civil construction services, transportation and logistics, and workforce services.
As the Erongo and ||Kharas regions have high levels of unemployment, indirect jobs created by the oil and gas industry can have a large impact on local communities, notes the report.
The Esia claims that those indirect jobs, as well as the jobs created because of oil and gas revenue being spent in the local economy, will have a high impact on employment for those regions.
However, the direct, indirect and induced employment impact of Venus development is small at national level, the report says.
Despite the government’s local content policy, Namibia also does not currently have a supply of upstream oil and gas products that could further contribute to job creation.
The assessment is for petroleum exploration licence 56/Block 2913B, which is located 300km from Oranjemund, 320km from Lüderitz and 700km from the main port of Walvis Bay from where the oil will be exported.
The licence is held by TotalEnergies and its joint venture partners, Impact Oil & Gas, QatarEnergy International E&P LLC and the National Petroleum Corporation of Namibia.
The capital-intensive project aims to extract oil in ultra deep waters (approximately 3 000m in depth).
The project involves drilling up to 40 wells, which is made up of 20 oil producing wells and 20 gas injection wells, the report states.
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