Abstract
Abstract The oil and gas industry human resources typically comprise of managers, engineers, assistant engineers and, administrators among others. This paper examines the key sources of the workforce that run Kuwait’s oil and gas industry. Most of the technical workforces including engineers and assistant engineers are originally from Kuwait University and the College of Technological Studies in Kuwait. This paper examines data on the number of assistant engineers in the oil and gas sector that graduated from the college of technological studies from 2006 to 2018. The college’s petroleum engineering technology department was started in 2001. Remarkably, its first batch of students graduated as assistant engineers two and a half years down the line with most of them joining companies in the oil and gas sector. The college offers two programs focusses on the production and exportation while the other one focusses on exploration and development. Additionally, this paper examines the number of students that have successfully graduated from the college’s petroleum engineering department over the last twelve years. Records indicate that between 2006 and 2018, about 7% of the institution’s graduates were from the petroleum engineering department. Moreover, the study established that there was no correlation between oil prices and the number of graduates from the petroleum department. The findings of this study will be insightful to decision-makers especially in crafting policies to improve college enrollment to fill the existing workforce gap in the oil and gas sector in Kuwait.
Highlights
Petroleum engineering is a wide field of engineering that is primarily involved with the exploration, development, production, and export of oil and gas
Upon successful completion of either of the programs, graduates can be employed in the oil and gas sector as assistant engineers or technical personnel
A study on petroleum engineering education pointed out the significance of this field to the oil and gas industry and drew special attention to the fact that the lack of regulation on the number of graduates each year could lead to a flooded job market [1]
Summary
Petroleum engineering is a wide field of engineering that is primarily involved with the exploration, development, production, and export of oil and gas. According to the Bureau of Labour (2015), petroleum and geological technicians assist engineers and geologists to explore and extract natural resources like natural gas, oil, and minerals [3]. Employment opportunities for petroleum and geological technicians is expected to increase by 12% between 2014 and 2024 This can be attributed to the increasing demand for natural gas that the increasing need for experts to help in exploration and extraction activities. Petroleum technicians can work in the oil/gas field, laboratory and office [6]. Petroleum technicians assist engineers to find the most effective of extracting and refining crude oil and natural gas. Petroleum technicians have practical experience since they spend most of their time in the field or in the laboratory where they collect and analyze data samples to ensure accurate monitoring of a site’s status of oil/gas wells productivities.
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