Ghana worried over wage disparities in oil sector

A senior Ghanaian official has disclosed that Ghanaian government is not comfortable with the disparities between the conditions of service of expatriate workers and locals in the upstream oil sector.“I think the areas that we have difficulties in is the fact that there is a very huge disparity in terms of conditions of service between local employees and expatriates, and I think that is an area we need to look at,” Minister for Employment and Social Welfare, Moses Asagatold Xinhua Tuesday during the sideline of the Third Ghana Oil and Gas Summit organized by the CWC Group. “I am not saying they should be paid the same salaries, but for the same qualification and the same quality of work, we think that we must bridge the gap between the conditions of service of especially salaries,” the minister said.On career development in the oil sector, the minister said government expected most of the oil companies to do technology transfer, and even give some money to state owned Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC) to be able to train GNPC technical staff. He said government was in the process of establishing an oil and gas unit in the country’s labor department which would facilitate and supervise recruitment into the oil and gas sector.This unit, the minister said, would provide information, forecast andbe able to relate to the universities to give an indication where job openings would be available maybe in a year’s time or two years’ time, so they should be able to prepare these graduates for us. “The unit will specialize in oil and gas issues, and especially the unit should be able to get information about employment of skilled labor, employment of middle level, and top management level,” he explained.According to Asaga, the unit would be concerned especially with thetechnical professional division comprising petroleum engineers,reservoir engineers, geologists and geophysicist, but more importantin the more middle-level technician grade type of artisanal labor,where the bulk of the country’s unemployed graduates will be able to fit in immediately.When Ghana discovered oil in commercial quantities in 2007,expectations were high that drilling of the black gold would helpimprove the quality of life of the people, especially throughemployment and development. “We have the skills but these skills needto be fine-tuned and need a certification, because most of them usedto work in the traditional technical areas, so you can be a welder,but you may not have the skills used for marine welding for example, “said the minister. He went further that those with these types ofartisanal skills background had good starting points to spend aboutsix months or one year to be able to understand and use to work in themarine sector. The government through the Management and ProductivityTraining Institute (MDPI) had been training middle-level manpowerexpected to be absorbed by the oil and gas sector.