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ENERGIA News Issue 2.3, August 1998

Gender Equity in International Petroleum Projects:
Women in the oil and gas sector

Dorothy Lele

Petroleum exploration and development is seen as men's work the world over - we think of oil rigs, either offshore or in rugged and isolated areas. But there is much more to petroleum production and distribution than drilling and pumping oil out of the ground. A wide range of jobs is involved, from geologists, geophysicists, petroleum engineers and technicians to lawyers, accountants, economists, computer analysts and salespersons.

More and more women are entering the petroleum sector and challenging old assumptions about what they can and cannot do. Two petroleum sector projects funded by the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) in Pakistan and China are examples of what is being done in very different situations.

The Pakistan Oil and Gas Sector Programme

CIDA has a Gender Equity Policy which requires that efforts are made to integrate gender in all of its projects. The Pakistan Oil and Gas Sector Programme (OGSP) is a six-year programme which began in 1996 to assist Pakistan in managing its oil and gas resources through technical assistance and training, technology transfer and policy advice.

As the Canadian Gender Equity Specialist on the implementing team, I am responsible for ensuring gender integration in the project. The first and most essential thing to do was to enlist the help of local consultants. It is they who know best what needs to be done and how, and they can speak for Pakistani women. We now have a Gender Equity Co-ordinator in Islamabad, a Gender Equity Assistant Co-ordinator in Karachi and a Gender Equity Training Consultant.

We began by conducting a baseline survey of the industry in December 1996, which found that 669 women were employed out of an industry workforce of about 34,000, that is, only about 2% of the total employed in the sector. This compares with 24% in the industry in Canada and about 33% in China.

On the one hand, the general attitude that we heard was that the petroleum sector is not a place for women - it requires fieldwork, which is physically demanding and often dangerous. On the other hand, many senior managers, in both the public and private sectors, recognised the need to attract the best young graduates to their workforce as it rapidly evolves into a knowledge-based employment field. These graduates include women. There may be fewer female students, especially in the sciences, but many of them are the top performers of their classes.

We invited senior oil company executives to two Gender Equity Seminars and were encouraged by their positive response and ideas. With their support, we invited professional women from their companies to get together for the first time at a Gender Equity Workshop, and heard from them about the problems they face. There are women without access to a women's washroom, a doctor who cannot be promoted solely because she is a woman, a mechanical engineer whose work was sabotaged, and others facing different forms of harassment.

This workshop was an inspiring experience, hearing from individuals how they overcame obstacles, or at least managed to survive them. It resulted in the formation of the Gender Equity in the Oil and Gas Sector - Pakistan Petroleum Women's Network (PPWN), a group of professional women now meeting regularly to share concerns and to work for improvements.

The OGSP Gender Equity Strategy

On the basis of these workshops, we developed a Gender Equity Strategy for OGSP. A major part of it is training, since the Programme includes funding for 127 months of training for women. Two women were awarded places on the first training attachments in Canada last year - a scholarship and an instructor training course. This year we are planning two scholarships and two industry attachments in Canada for women, as well as sponsoring other training in Pakistan.

We organise field trips to oil field concessions in order to orientate non-technical female staff to the petroleum industry. We offer career orientation sessions to female students at major educational institutions to attract them to the industry, and, at the same time, match them with companies for summer internships that help them gain job experience.

We have found it effective to combine gender equity efforts with the Programme's Human Resource Development initiatives wherever possible. We recently offered a Gender Diversity session as part of a Human Resources Conference for senior executives and personnel managers in the petroleum sector. We are also planning to sponsor a course on the changing human resource demands of privatisation in the industry, which will include a session and case study on the importance and advantages of gender diversity in the workforce.

The women themselves have pointed out the need to increase their visibility as valuable employees. They will be the stars of a 15-minute promotional film we are sponsoring on women in the petroleum industry. We are also arranging for newspaper coverage and TV and radio exposure of events and accomplishments.

Women's energy needs are the other major part of our mandate. Last summer, the Islamabad Co-ordinator worked with the Energy Working Group of the Planning Commission to develop a paper on gender issues for integration into Pakistan's Ninth Five-Year Plan. We are also working with the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Resources (MPNR) to assist it in integrating gender into its work.

Positive Results

We have been most encouraged to see very positive results after our first year of effort. PPWN members have been stimulated and motivated through the Programme's support. They are planning a national Conference at the end of the year to decide on future action.

The Secretaries of the Ministry of Petroleum and the Ministry of Women's Development have been very supportive. The first female Section Officer was appointed last November at MPNR. OGSP is being asked for assistance and models to help similar programmes in other sectors.

Probably our hardest challenge is to offer support that will be self-sustaining - initiatives that will result in the continuation of interventions, and support for gender equity after the Programme is completed.

The Oil and Gas Technology Transfer Programme in China

I am also the Women in Development (WID) monitoring person on the monitoring team for another CIDA petroleum project. The Oil and Gas Technology Transfer Programme (OGTTP) supports five petroleum research institutes in China and is aimed at capacity development in advanced oil and gas technologies.

At the beginning of the Programme in 1993, CIDA and the China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) set a target that 30% of the petroleum personnel trained, as well as the Canadians providing the training, should be women. Although the promotion of women's participation was a new type of initiative for the Chinese partners, they took it on as a challenge and made it their own objective.

I visited the institutes last year, in the fifth year of the Programme, and found great enthusiasm for CIDA's Gender Equity Policy among the women involved in the Programme, and an impressive level of commitment and support among senior male leaders. 33% of those trained in China and 28% of those sent to Canada for Professional Attachment Programmes in 1996 were women. More women have been promoted to senior engineers, and to leaders of research groups and project teams, than before the project began. One of the five directors of the institutes involved in the Programme is now a woman.

Women at the Chinese Institutes who were asked about the WID policy of the Programme were very strongly supportive. They say the OGTTP has allowed women to gain new skills, experiences and career opportunities they would otherwise not have been possible. A female professor at the Southwest Petroleum Institute in Nanchong, Sichuan, told me that women in the institutes with which CIDA is working are “very lucky”. “We love this Policy with all our hearts,” she said.

Efforts to promote women's participation in the OGTTP have had an important catalytic effect. Professional women in the institutes affected have become more aware of the possibilities available to them for professional development and career advancement. They are requesting information, material, and electronic links to gender issues and experiences elsewhere. They are now seeking new ways to promote change.

These women are looking to Canada for examples and advice on what to do, even though there are fewer women working in the petroleum sector in Canada than in China. Petroleum companies in Canada can provide models in employment equity, diversity management and mentoring and networking programmes, but do not yet have enough senior women in the technical specialities to meet CIDA's 30% target for Canadian participation in the Programme. Although there are now more women entering the Canadian petroleum sector they are mainly young. There are few women with the seniority, and experience required, to provide the training demanded by the Chinese. Only about 14% of the Canadians involved as technical specialists in the Programme are women.

Realising Women's Potential

The efforts, interest and achievements of partners in both countries in promoting women's professional development offer good examples of what can be accomplished in the petroleum sector worldwide. To a great extent human productivity depends on the encouragement and supportive atmosphere provided in the workplace.

The women I've met in Pakistan's oil and gas sector often work alone and face very difficult conditions and challenges. Women I met in China, who had been to Canada and were given more challenging responsibilities on their return, were full of enthusiasm and energy for their work. It seems to me from what I've seen that the most important factor in raising women's self-confidence and productivity is an atmosphere where their contributions are valued and respected, so that they want to do their best work - not just make a living.

Dorothy Lele works as an independent consultant on international development projects. She has been specialising in the social and gender aspects of energy projects since her assignment with CIDA in 1989-1991. For more information, please contact:
Ms. Dorothy Lele, 283 Victoria Street, Kingston, Ontario, Canada K7L3Z2. Tel. +613.549.4290, Fax +613.547.6089, Email 5DL4@qsilver.queensu.ca