OIL BOOM * 100 US scholarships for petro-chemical industry

Front Page: Tuesday, September 23, 2008.
Story: Albert K. Salia
THE US Government has agreed to offer scholarship to Ghanaians to train in the petro-chemical industry in three states in the United States of America (USA).
The programme, which will be conducted at the Masters degree level in universities in those states, will enrol 100 students to begin with from January next year.
The Minister of Information and National Orientation, Mr Stephen Asamoah-Boateng, told the Daily Graphic that the deal was clinched during the recent State Visit of President J. A. Kufuor to Washington, D.C.
The minister, who was part of the government delegation to the USA, said on his return home that the training programme was part of the US government’s support for the country in its preparation towards the drilling of oil in the country.
Mr Asamoah-Boateng said the graduate programme was geared towards building the manpower base before the drilling of the oil in 2010.
He said under the programme, accounting and legal staff would also be trained in readiness for the oil boom.
He said the duration of the programme would be between one-and-half years and two years and indicated that although the exact number to be trained would be worked out later, the programme would be rolled on to enable as many people benefit from the petro-chemical-engineering field.
Mr Asamoah-Boateng explained that the government had wished to begin the programme this month but that was not possible because contact with the universities in Texas, Oklahoma and California would take some time.
He noted that hopefully the programme would take off after the mid-semester holidays in January next year.
The minister said the government was grateful to the US government for the support and expressed optimism that the programme would help Ghana to have the optimum number of personnel to man Ghana’s oil industry.
He said a Cabinet sub-committee would be formed to work out the modalities, with support from technocrats in the public service.
Mr Asamoah-Boateng said the technical team would work out very clear guidelines and criteria for the selection of applicants for the programme.