Enhancing National Participation in the Oil and Gas Industry in Uganda

The general topic for this report is how countries which have discovered valuable oil and gas resources actually may benefit from encouraging national citizens and domestic firms to participate in developing and extracting these resources. The experiences from other countries with significant oil and gas endowments are quite mixed. It is argued that the key to success is to create a dynamic setting for national participation which allows for broad based capacity building in national citizens and domestic firms, i.e. to expand capacity and industrial diversity.

Particular attention is devoted to the specific situation of Uganda, where the industrial base to start with is rather weak. This means that national participation in Uganda’s oil and gas sector is a huge industry challenge, which coheres with the broader challenge of enhancing private sector development. The discussion concludes with 20 recommendations which in different ways should contribute to the creation of an adequate institutional framework, to build capacity in people, to ensure adequate development of enterprises, to facilitate national participation, and to monitor achievements in that respect.