Hess Corp. was marketer for Guyana’s 4th oil lift

Dec 30, 2020 News

By Kiana Wilburg

Vice President, Dr. Bharrat Jagdeo

Kaieteur News – Guyana’s fourth lift of approximately one million barrels of sweet, light Liza crude was actually marketed by Hess International Sales LLC and sold to BP Oil Supply, a division of BP Products North America. Confirming this last evening was Vice President, Dr. Bharrat Jagdeo.
With respect to the procurement process that led to the selection of Hess Corporation, one of the Stabroek Block partners, as the crude marketer, Dr. Jagdeo said he would be addressing this at a press conference, which he intends to hold in the first week of January 2021.
In the meantime, Central Bank Governor, Dr. Gobind Ganga, said that the country is expected to receive US$49.3M next week for the sale of the fourth lift. He told this newspaper that this amount will take the total revenue in the Natural Resource Fund which also holds royalties from the Liza Phase One Project, to approximately US$198M.
Guyana’s first three cargoes of approximately one million barrels of oil were sold to Shell Western Supply and Trading. The first cargo was sold on February 19, 2020, raking in nearly US$55M. The second lift brought in US$35M while the third brought in US$46M.
One resource watchdog that is expected to provide information on oil sale agreements in a prompt fashion for public scrutiny is Guyana’s Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (GY-EITI).
Following several checks on the local chapter’s website, no independent information was published about the agreement the Government entered into with a new oil marketer, Hess Corporation or even for Shell Western Supply and Trading.
Requirement 4.2 of the EITI Standard that Guyana is expected to adhere to explicitly states: “Where the sale of the State’s share of production of oil, gas and/or mineral resources or other revenues collected in kind is material, the government, including state-owned enterprises, are required to disclose the volumes received and sold by the state (or third parties appointed by the state to sell on their behalf), the revenues received from the sale, and the revenues transferred to the state from the proceeds of oil, gas and minerals sold. Where applicable, this should include payments (in cash or in kind) related to swap agreements and resource-backed loans.”
The Standard goes on to state that: “The published data must be disaggregated by individual buying company and to levels commensurate with the reporting of other payments and revenue streams (4.7). Multi-stakeholder groups, in consultation with buying companies, are expected to consider whether disclosures should be broken down by individual sale, type of product and price.” (SEE LINK FOR MORE DETAILS: https://eiti.org/document/eiti-standard-2019#r4-2)
Efforts to reach Head of GY-EITI, Dr. Rudy Jadoopat regarding the fact that GY-EITI is yet to publish the sale agreements for any of the fourth lifts have unfortunately, proved futile.

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