Senegal is becoming one of the most exciting oil and gas plays to emerge in recent years in sub-Saharan Africa´s largely underexplored oil and gas sector. The country may be a relatively new player in terms of production coming on stream, but in fact, oil and gas exploration has been taking place in the country as far back as 1961. It was only until major world-class offshore oil and gas discoveries were made in 2014-2016 that global energy investors began to truly realize the huge potential of the MSGBC Basin, which comprises the offshore waters of Mauritania, Senegal, The Gambia, Guinea-Bissau, and Guinea-Conakry.
Senegal did not want to repeat the mistakes that some other sub-Saharan oil and gas producing countries had endured by seeing their economies becoming far too reliant on hydrocarbons, thus rendering other economic sectors uncompetitive, known as the “oil curse. For this reason, stakeholders from all over Senegal set out to glean industry best practices from around the world, travelling to Canada, Norway and many well-established African oil producing countries like Angola and Nigeria, among others. As a result, two crucial entities were born that would help shape Senegal´s burgeoning oil and gas sector. The first was the (Comité D´Orientation Stratégique)-COS PETROGAZ, an entity falling directly under the Presidency of Senegal, whose goal is to ensure that President Macky Sall´s ambitious vision for an oil and gas sector focusing on transparency, good governance and the promotion of local content is implemented from day one. Today, COS-PETROGAZ continues to spearhead the ongoing development of Senegal´s oil and gas sector. The second pivotal institution for the industry was the Institut National du Pétrole et du Gaz (INPG), the (National Petroleum Institute). Its mission is to help recruit, train and develop the next generation of Senegalese petroleum engineers, geologists, and oil and gas technical professionals to avoid having to rely upon an expensive expatriate workforce. Both of these institutions have been particularly successful in their respective missions and set the stage for the large-scale influx of foreign direct investment (FDI) and the growing involvement of numerous IOC´s in Senegal to date.