LARKANA: Speakers at a conference on “Corporate social responsibilities (CSR) of oil and gas exploration firms and local communities” have sought proper utilisation of production bonus and CSR funds of companies on development projects in the areas of their operation and urged the multi-national companies to stop paying extortion money to feudal lords in the name of CSR.
They demanded legislation for monitoring oil and gas exploration activities of the multi-national companies and consultation with the provincial and district governments before the launching of the projects.
The conference was held here on Tuesday under the aegis of Participatory Development Initiatives (PDI) of Oxfam-GB.
The speakers said that oil and gas companies operating in different districts of Sindh had not only created problems for the people but were also spreading pollution and diseases.
They said that Sindh’s contribution to gas and oil production of the country was 72 per cent and 52 per cent, respectively, but most of the people in the areas of operation were deprived of health and education facilities.
Even the amount of production bonus paid to the Sindh government and district governments by the companies was not properly utilised, they said. It was the responsibility of the government to use the money on public welfare projects, they added.
They criticised the government’s petroleum policy and said that oil extraction in offshore areas would prove harmful for the sources of livelihood of people of coastal areas. They said that even developed countries were not extracting oil from offshore areas at the cost of people’s sources of livelihood.
The speakers included Khair Mohammad Shaikh, Larkana PPP’s vice- president and president of Larkana Chamber of Commerce of Commerce and Industry, Mukthiar Samoo, Syed Javed Shah and Kudrat Sundrani from Ghotki and labour leader Khalid Chandio.PDI programme officer Ishak Soomro spoke about problems faced by the people living in oil and gas producing areas. Giving details of gas and oil fields, he said of the 122 crude oil reserves in the country, 93 were in Sindh which produced 56.36 per cent of the total production of the country. Out of 156 gas reserves, 121 were in Sindh with their annual production of 72 per cent of the country’s total production, he added.
He criticised the petroleum ministry for failing to implement environmental and CSR laws in the oil and gas producing districts of the Sindh and giving a free hand to the MNCs to spread toxic gases and threaten environment.
A documentary depicting how poisonous chemicals were being released into water, causing skin diseases, was shown at the conference.
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