ISLAMABAD: The centre on Thursday blamed the provinces for inadequate development of areas around oil and gas fields despite provision of sufficient funds by the petroleum exploration and development firms under corporate social responsibility (CSR).

Secretary Petroleum Sikandar Sultan Raja told the Senate Standing Committee on Petroleum led by Senator Mohsin Aziz that the provinces were neither spending funds for development under CSR programme of the E&P companies nor responding to communications as to why these funds remain unutilised.

He said the E&P companies were required under the laws and policies of the government to transfer certain amounts under CSR to the respective deputy commissioners where exploration and development activities are ongoing but these funds remain unspent because these have to be processed by a committee for the purpose of transparency.

An official said the relevant committees comprise local political representatives, top officials of the provincial government and district administration.

“I have personally written letters to the chief secretaries and none have even bothered to respond,” said Mr Raja. He said billons of rupees worth of funds, meant for the development of schools, health and water supply schemes remained stuck up with the deputy commissioners and assistant commissioners.

The committee took serious notice of the situation and ordered that details of funds from all the fields and companies be submitted before the next session to ascertain how the funds were spent, what outcomes they have delivered, where did they remain unutilised and in what quantities, depriving the poor people of the intended development objectives.

The standing committee also constituted a sub-committee to implement the government’s hiring policy for the local residents around the oil and gas fields by respective companies. It was decided that members of sub-committee will visit eight oil and gas exploration blocks in the first round and analyse the employment situation there.

It also expressed displeasure over the non-installation of reverse osmosis (RO) plants for water purification by the companies involved in exploration of oil and gas in Sanghar, Sindh and sought details from Deputy Commissioner Sanghar about it. Details of tenders being floated for installation of RO plants and funds spent so far were also sought.

The committee directed oil and gas exploration companies to install 10 RO plants in each district surrounding the fields. Deputy Managing Director, Pakistan Petroleum Limited said the company has spent Rs1 billion annually on CSR activities in exploration sites.

Senator Jahanzeb Jamaldini complained that China Pakistan Economic Corridor did not improve the living standards of coastal areas as the people living there were facing acute shortage of drinking water. He alleged that drinking water was being stolen from Gwadar and being sold to people at exorbitant rates.

He advocated that oil and gas exploration companies should give employment to natives on priority basis.

Managing Director of Oil and Gas Development Company (OGDC) briefed the members regarding his company’s exploration activities. He informed the committee that PGDC had 48 exploratory blocks and has achieved five discoveries over the last one year. The company is drilling at 15 blocks at present and operating 47 oil fields across the country, including 15 in Punjab, three in KP, 26 in Sindh and three in Balochistan.

Published in Dawn, June 29th, 2018