3 ½ yrs later… Guyana still to tap Exxon’s special fund Social Projects

Nov 08, 2019 News

Three-and-a-half years after Esso Exploration and Production Guyana Limited (EEPGL)—the Contractor for the Stabroek Block—committed to providing the Ministry of the Presidency (MotP) with US$300,000 each calendar year, for ‘Corporate Social Projects’, the Department of Energy (DoE) is still to tap into the fund.
Department of Energy Director, Dr. Mark Bynoe, in a brief interview with this publication yesterday, confirmed that the Department has not approved any projects to be funded from the money provided by the Contractor for the Environmental and Social Projects.
He did indicate that there are two projects in the pipeline that are currently being evaluated for approval, but declined to provide any further details.
According to Dr. Bynoe, Government had decided that projects to be funded under the CSR Account would have to be tailored, to be aligned with the administration’s Green State Development Strategy (GSDS).
Under the Production Sharing Agreement (PSA) inked between the Government of Guyana, EEPGL, Hess Guyana Exploration Guyana and CNOOC-Nexen Petroleum Guyana, “the Minister and contractor shall establish a programme of financial support for environmental and social projects to be funded by the Contractor.”
Under Article 28 of the PSA which deals with Social Responsibility and Protection of the Environment, “The Contactor shall directly fund” the amount of US$300,000 per calendar year with any funded but unspent portion of the amount being carried over to ensuing years.
Article 28.7 of the PSA stipulates that the Minister and the contractor shall meet annually to agree which projects shall be funded in a year.
Asked to provide an update on the state of the account, the Energy Department Head said he would be unable to, since this was an account set up by the Ministry.
Additionally ExxonMobil is said to have already provided more than $550M during 2018 and 2019, including $400M given to Conservation International Guyana, for a programme to advance Guyana’s sustainable economy through education, research, sustainable management and conservation.
Other social contributions made by ExxonMobil include a $120M grant to Iwokrama for the Centre’s Science Programme; $31M given to Volunteer Youth Corps for Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) programmes; including robotics.
The company has also provided a number of grants to agencies such as Civil Defence Commission’s Voluntary Emergency Response Team (VERT) training, supporting volunteers across the regions and $5M given to Youth Challenge Guyana (YCG) supporting a programme to enhance the agricultural food production skills.

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3 ½ yrs later… Guyana still to tap Exxon’s special fund Social Projects

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