industry news downstream gas challenge 2021: growing interest, umat wins 2nd edition fairly a nascent industry in ghana, the gas sector is rapidly evolving to become a veritable necessity in economic life. yet, public knowledge on the com- modity, its relevance, processes and the in- stitution behind it remain short of desired understanding. realisation dawned on several existing challenges: that there is a wide gap be- tween academia and the overall oil and gas industry, specifically the gas industry. it was, thus, very necessary that a vehicle be set up that could sufficiently be used to close the gap. that there is a need to pre- pare young people, build their capacity to take over the industry, which means scout- ing for the best to be prepared and trained for the future. that media reporting on the gas sector show lapses in understanding and relation of topical subjects regarding the sector. “gas is very new to us as a country and so the understanding may not have been al- ways there. so we realised that we have to partner the media as well to help educate them about the gas industry, to also help them with the gas reporting,” says au- gustina osei asare, head of government relations at the ghana national gas com- pany (gngc). as the formal state agency responsible for coordinating all aspects of the gas value chain in the country, ghana gas, as gngc is widely known, did identify the present need to educate the general public about the use of gas, the health and safety as- pects of it, what the company does with the indigenous gas produced in-country, and what exactly the purpose of the ghana gas is. to meet these needs, the tertiary quiz competition dubbed ‘gas challenge’ was birthed in 2019. “the government relations depart- ment of ghana gas sat down and we de- cided that based on these objectives, the vehicle that we can use is the gas chal- lenge concept, because in educating people you don’t want to make it boring, it has to be fun. while people are having fun, it is usually easier to process information,” she explains. and that’s how the concept came about to develop gas challenge to engage students of university institutions which offer oil and gas related courses. after the first edition, however, interest in the con- test seemed to have gone beyond the en- ergy-focused institutions, with non-oil and gas schools, expressing the desire to par- ticipate. gas challenge in its initial year fea- tured the stakeholders’ edition, which saw “ we decided that based on these objectives, the vehi- cle that we can use is the gas challenge concept, be- cause in educating people you don’t want to make it boring, it has to be fun.” - augustine osei asare, head of government rela- tions at the ghana na- tional gas challenge regulators of the energy sector, the media, civil society organisations including insti- tutions like the public interest accounta- bility committee (piac), kite, ghana broadcasting corporation (gbc), graphic corporation, and the ministry of energy in competition. ministry of energy won that edition. chairperson of the gas challenge committee, augustina osei-asare says the entire company has been overwhelmed by the patronage so far from the universities, “because we have been around for just two years, unlike the science and maths quiz that has been there since the 1990s. but you can see that people are extremely en- thusiastic about it and they really want to be associated with the brand.” first edition organised by the ghana national gas company under the auspices of the min- istries of energy, information and educa- tion and supported by piac, the first competition had nine schools participat- ing: the university of ghana, the kwame nkrumah university of science and tech- nology (knust), the university of mines and technology (umat), takoradi tech- nical university, regional maritime uni- versity, communication technology university, university of cape coast, all nations university, and the uni- versity of energy & natural resources. umat emerged winners of the first edi- tion. ghana 2nd edition due to the coronavirus pandemic, the gas challenge competition which could not happen in 2020 took place this year, which grand finale happened on novem- ber 30 at the university for professional studies, accra (upsa). it involved the same set of universities in participation. and like the previous edition, the univer- sity of ghana (ug), team propane – zone 1; knust, team lean gas – zone 2; umat, team condensates – zone 3 made it to the final contest, after winning in the various zonal competitions. at the end of 12 energyghana.com february 2022