Accra, Jan 30, 2018 - A one-day workshop for over sixty stakeholders, drawn from Government, Civil Society Organizations, Academia and the Media, to deliberate on the 2017 Annual Petroleum Report was held at the Mensvic Hotel, East Legon, in Accra yesterday.
The Report on the Petroleum Funds was prepared in line with Section 48 of the Petroleum Revenue Management Act, (PRMA), 2011, (Act 815) as amended (Act 893) to cover the collection, utilization and management of petroleum revenues during the 2017 fiscal year. The Petroleum report was submitted with the 2018 Budget Statement and Economic Policy to Parliament.
Addressing participants, Mr. Frimpong Kwarteng Amaning, Director, Real Sector Division of the Ministry of Finance, noted that the Report, the seventh in the series, highlighted the events in the upstream petroleum sector, including the activities of the Ministry of Energy, Petroleum Commission, Ghana National Gas Company, Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC) and its subsidiaries.
He stated that Report also accounts for the petroleum revenues received during the period and the returns on the Ghana Petroleum Funds.
Mr. Kwarteng Amaning stated that the year 2017 marked a decade since oil and gas was discovered in commercial quantities. The year, he added, also witnessed the arrival of the newly built Floating, Production, Storage and Offloading (FPSO) John Agyekum Kufuor, to be used for the Offshore Cape Three Points (OCTP), also known as the Sankofa-Gye Nyame (SGN) Fields, oil and gas project.
Production of crude oil from the SGN Fields, Mr Kwarteng Amaning noted, commenced in May 2017, as was the first gas production from the Tweneboa-Enyenra-Ntomme (TEN) Fields. The SGN Field, he said, was subsequently commissioned in July by H. E. Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo.
Mr. Kwarteng Amaning stated that in compliance with the PRMA, the 2017 Budget Statement and Economic Policy made some proposals to Parliament for the revision of the Annual Budget Funding Amount (ABFA) priority areas for the 2017-2019 period. According to him, the proposed areas were Agriculture; Physical Infrastructure and Service Delivery in Education; Physical Infrastructure and Service Delivery in Health; and Road, Rail and other critical Infrastructure Development.
He indicated that the selection of these priority areas was to give focus to infrastructure development in critical areas of the economy adding that the Government of Ghana will continue to ensure transparency, judicious and impactful use of petroleum revenues to creating opportunities for all Ghanaians and improve their wellbeing as well.
There were Presentations by GNPC on ‘Developments Upstream in the Petroleum Sector in 2017’; Presentations by Ministry of Finance on ‘Petroleum Receipts in 2017’; and ‘Utilization of Petroleum Receipts in 2017’; and a Presentation by Bank of Ghana on ‘Performance of the Ghana Petroleum Funds in 2017’. END.