Economic crisis a chance in Oman to look beyond oil and gas sector, say experts

Muscat: The current economic crisis offers abundant opportunities to expand beyond the oil and gas sector, a top official from Petroleum Development Oman (PDO) has said.
“Never lose the opportunity of this crisis; we have to think of diversification and expand our thoughts beyond oil and gas,” Suleiman Al Tobi, Oil Director of South, PDO, told the Times of Oman on the sidelines of the official opening of the 11th Annual Asset Integrity Management Summit, on Monday.
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“This is the time to look at things in different ways. Our efforts should be invested in where we can control our activities and try to do only the necessary,” Al Tobi said.
“Only through that can we contribute to the country,” he added. He also said it may take some time to overcome the current crisis.
“Even these tough times will help our country find opportunities to diversify, which can add value to the country’s economic situation,” Al Tobi asserted.
Speaking about the job loss in the market, he said, “We haven’t released any of our staff until now because of the oil price dip.”
“When there is some drop in our activities we will relocate our staff to other areas; our workers are still going on and we continue to drill wells.”
According to Al Tobi, many people are unaware of the current situation in Oman. People should follow what is happening in Oman and outside Oman and then only can they adapt to the situation, he stated. This is the fourth consecutive time Oman is hosting the Annual Asset Integrity Management Summit.
Experts in asset integrity, inspection, operations and maintenance from the leading oil and gas companies in Oman and the rest of the Gulf Cooperation Council region are the main participants in the summit.
The meeting kicked off with a discussion on how to maintain companies’ existing assets amidst the low oil price market through effective asset integrity management programmes and solutions.
The event was inaugurated with keynote addresses by PDO’s Al Tobi, Livio Accattatis, general manager, Technical Services Division, Orpic, Dave Campbell, chief operating officer (COO) and vice president (VP), Oman Operations, BP Oman, and Chris Breeze, VP and Oman Country Chairman, Shell Development Oman.
Other notable speakers included experts from OOCEP, Salalah Methanol, Occidental Oman, Daleel Petroleum, Qatar Petroleum, ADNOC distribution and more.
The four-day event will also have presentations from Doosan Babcock, DNV GL, Aveva, Permasense, Integrated Global Services, NMES Oman, Cortec and Texel, Mistras Group, SENES Engineering Consultants Oman, Integrity Smart Services and Al Takamol Al Hadith Cont. Co, who are also participating as sponsors of the event.
The Annual Asset Integrity Management Summit is organised by the International Quality and Productivity Centre (IQPC).
The first day produced a variety of discussions and presentations focused on adopting a lean approach to maintaining assets, implementing cost-optimisation strategies, given the current low oil price market scenario and improving asset utilisation to maximise return on assets.
The summit will conclude on Wednesday.