73 undertake skills training

A GROUP of 73 Papua New Guineans have taken the first steps towards an exciting new career, completing the first stage of their production operations and maintenance training programme.
The trainee-technicians celebrated this occasion with a graduation dinner on Monday at the Gateway Hotel with their families and Esso Highlands Ltd representatives.
Trainees who meet the programme’s academic and behavioural expectations will travel to Canada next month to complete one year of advanced skills training before returning to Papua New Guinea to begin facility specific training at PNG LNG facilities.
Ultimately, the operations and maintenance trainees will become qualified technicians capable of operating and maintaining the PNG LNG project’s Hides gas conditioning plant and LNG plant along with associated pipelines and wells.
Patti McNulty, PNG LNG project training and national workforce development manager, praised the trainees’ commitment to the course over the past 18 months.
“We congratulate this group of very capable and inspiring Papua New Guineans who have reached a significant milestone in their training and development,” McNulty said.
“Building the skills of Papua New Guinean workers through training is an integral part of the PNG LNG project’s national content plan.
As of third quarter this year, the project’s construction workforce was more than 11,000, and more than 7,200 are Papua New Guineans.
“We are providing training opportunities to our workforce covering a wide range of areas to enhance the skills and knowledge of local workforce for both their current roles and future employment opportunities either with the project or elsewhere,” she said
Trainees had completed a 12-month foundation skills programme, which included mathematics, computing,
physics and chemistry, and were now completing a six-month basic skills training programme designed to introduce the fundamentals of the oil and gas industry.
Selection of a second intake of operations and maintenance trainees is underway with training scheduled to begin next month.