Dear Editor,
The fourth edition of Oil Dorado? a compilation of essays edited and published by John Mair will be launched in Georgetown this week. The book contains several new articles dealing with the rapidly evolving Oil and Gas industry in Guyana, and it retains some of the articles that were in earlier editions of the same title. The combination of new and old articles and the fact that this is the fourth edition in a span of less than three years give readers a sense of how fast Guyana is moving.
John has continued to place a question mark in the title, implicit it seems, of his continuing uncertainty about Guyana’s black gold. I was hoping that by now, after nearly three years of oil production, currently at a rate of over 350,000 barrels per day and with projected revenues of over a billion US dollars for Guyana for this year, that he would have considered dropping the question mark. But I guess uncertainty about the pudding awaits the eating.
Editor, for full disclosure, I am one of the contributors to the book. My article, Guyana will be transformed by Oil and Gas Revenues is the first chapter and my second article, Lessons from Midland, Texas is the concluding chapter. May I also inform your readers that I do not receive any compensation for these contributions.
There are twenty six other chapters written by several well-known authorities on oil and gas, on Guyana, its business climate, environmental conditions and protections, its place in the Caribbean oil and gas sphere, the Production Sharing Agreement and about the fears around fossil fuel extraction and production. Altogether, a wide range of opinions, conjectures, analyses and futuristic speculations. I believe that your readers will find enough material in the book to substantiate whatever views they already hold and still find enough contrary material to force some re-evaluation of what they believe. For readers not so encumbered, there is something on which to build foundational opinions about a facet of life that will dominate their existence for at least the next thirty years and perhaps well beyond.
It is imperative that Guyanese take control of the risk and the opportunity now. This book should help at the personal level and I hope at the political and policy level.
Sincerely,
Tulsi Dyal Singh, MD.
