The oldest building at the UCU campus. The university is looking to the future with new oil courses.
Uganda Christian University, one of the country’s oldest and most prestigious higher education institutions, is seeking to develop petroleum management expertise through an Oil and Gas Leadership Institute which is expected to evolve into a fully fledged department. Established in 2010 and currently housed within the university’s School of Research and Postgraduate Studies, the institute is the product of a visit to the University of Queensland in Australia in 2009.
The study tour, headed by the Deputy Vice Chancellor responsible for external relations, was impressed by the Australian university’s Petroleum School and came back with plans to establish something similar at UCU’s main campus in Mukono.
“Today the Oil and Gas Leadership Institute we have is a product of the Australia visit. The institute has spearheaded the introduction of sustained training programs at the campus, a vital step towards preparing human resource for the oil industry,” Peter Davis Mutesasira, the institute’s coordinator told Oil in Uganda.
After three years in operation, the institute has been able to design course units for three different faculties: Law, Business Administration and Social Sciences. The courses are optional for students taking those subjects, but have attracted big interest. According to Mr Mutesasira, who lectures in law, about 85 percent of more than 600 students in the three faculties choose to take the courses.
The courses are tailored to each discipline, focusing on oil law, oil accounting and oil and environment for law, business administration and social science students respectively. “The interest in oil is overwhelming and cuts across all courses. In the business faculty, petroleum accounting is very famous while in social sciences, the study of social impacts of oil discovery has also attracted a big number,” Mr Mutesasira explains.
Reaching professionals
The institute plans to unveil more programs soon, starting with short courses for people already working in the oil sector or planning to move into it.
Vincent Kisenyi, the Dean of Business Administration, said in a recent interview that a major aim of the UCU institute is to enhance the skills of people in oil-related employment.
“We did a survey for four months (February-June 2010) where we consulted stakeholders about the pertinent opportunities and challenges to determine training needs. This is an opportunity for Ugandans to learn and manage their own resources instead of foreigners doing this for us.”
The short courses will draw on the areas already taught to full time students, namely, law, accounting, and environment in relation to oil. The new courses will be offered in the new academic year, starting in March, at UCU’s Kampala campus in Mengo.
Such trainings are seen as an important way of helping to prevent the ‘oil curse.’
Community outreach
The institute also hopes to take its work beyond the classroom and into the communities of oil-producing regions.
“We carried out a baseline survey to identify the areas in which training is key,” says Mutesasira. “Soon, we will return to teach them about environment conservation, promoting other activities alongside oil and gas, as well as the available opportunities for the locals in the sector. All this is in a bid to avoid the oil curse that may accrue out of ignorance.”
Patson Arinaitwe, another UCU law lecturer, says that the idea of coaching communities to ready themselves for oil resulted from research which revealed that most Ugandans know very little about the topic. Yet, he emphasises, it is extremely important to respond to opportunities and challenges arising from the new oil and gas industry, as the country moves towards oil production.
Capacity challenges
To achieve its training potential, however, the UCU institute itself needs more staff training, which is a major frustration for the university. Of the eight lecturers currently teaching oil courses, only the three teaching the law courses are fully qualified. The five who teach oil related courses in the business and social science faculties are only partially trained.
This, according to the school leadership, has delayed the formation of a fully fledged oil and gas or energy resources department. According to the National Council for Higher Education, a university department must have a minimum number of staff with doctoral degrees, as well as lecturers and teaching assistants.
Mr. Mutesasira however says that the campus has partnered with Tullow Oil to offer training to their lecturers. “Last year we had three of our former students return from Tobago in the southern Caribbean after a two-year training and they are now lecturing in oil and gas law. We hope to send more this year and thus find a way of having enough human resources in preparation for a well-established oil and gas department.”
Report by FN
Tullow supports oil training
In a separate development, Tullow Oil last week called for applications for the 2013/14 Tullow Group Scholarship Scheme. At least 20 Ugandans will stand a chance of studying overseas for postgraduate degrees.
According to Cathy Adengo, Tullow’s Communications Manager in Uganda, the program is designed “to increase Ugandan national expertise in the oil and gas and other sectors in the country.” Scholarships will be offered in the fields of engineering and technology, environment and geosciences, oil and gas economics, business journalism, logistics and supply chain, law and legal courses, and other applied sciences with the exception of medicine.
Other countries that will benefit from the program, which offers a total of 114 scholarships this year, are Congo Brazzaville, Ethiopia, Gabon, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Kenya, Mauritania, Uruguay and Surinam.