National Oil chief executive Sumayya Hassan-Athmani said the firm's long-term goal is to develop a large pool of skilled professionals. PHOTO | FILE
State-owned firm National Oil Corporation of Kenya is investing Sh410 million in training of 34 employees to take up jobs created as the company embarks on its oil exploration programme.
The company said the employees would be sent to universities in the UK, America, Canada, Australia and Netherlands to study different aspects of oil exploration at the postgraduate level.
National Oil said the programme is meant to help the company avoid hiring foreigners owing to a lack of qualified local staff.
“Most of these jobs will require specialised skills and Kenyans risk losing out to expatriate workers if the right local human resource capacities are not developed,” said National Oil chief executive Sumayya Hassan-Athmani in a statement.
The 34 will study specialist courses in reservoir engineering, geochemistry, geophysics, petroleum economics and petroleum law over a two-year period.
“Through the management trainee programme National Oil’s long-term goal is to develop a large pool of skilled professionals so as to ensure that the industry is not constrained by a lack of adequate local skilled labour,” she said.
National Oil said local universities only offer general courses. It is, however, working with the University of Nairobi and Kenyatta University to develop courses that would be relevant to the nascent industry.
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