Sustainability
Monitor is a guest in Namibia and we intend to keep this well in mind in every aspect of business.
People . Safety . Environment
PEOPLE
We work closely with the Ministry of Mines and Energy and our local partners, so that our plans are firmly set to make sure that we are working for the national benefit of the people of Namibia. In addition, we have undertaken programmes to train local people to use the specialist equipment we have brought to the country to carry out some of our early exploration work, both in Namibia and in other African countries in the future.
SAFETY
Before any action or work programme, our first step is to prepare an Operational Plan that has safety at its heart. Our teams know that this is their priority, and that our management is fully engaged.
ENVIRONMENT
While our first licence area in the Owambo basin is separated intentionally by the Ministry from the Etosha National Park and we are some 500 kms plus from the Kavango River, we continue to be extremely careful in our approach to our exploration programme. We have emphasized techniques that are harmless to the environment, such as Remote sensing by means of satellite imaging, Geochemical soil sampling and Passive seismic surveys. Our plan is to undertake some additional surveys with these techniques before advancing with low impact conventional 2D seismic acquisition.
This will only take place after a thorough independent Environment Impact Assessment that will need to be approved by all the Ministries involved in the process.
We are exploring to discover and produce hydrocarbons in the Owambo Basin. In doing so, we will always work with the Government and the people of Namibia to minimise the environmental impact of our operations. We are very aware of the natural beauty of Namibia and that we are working in a water scarce country, with the result that our conceptual development plans include buried pipelines to export the oil safely and to bring water from the coast to avoid the use of groundwater in our operations. Namibia is blessed with abundant solar and wind energy, supporting the development of oil & gas fields with zero carbon emissions as the facilities can be powered without the use of fossil fuels.
Our focus is always to minimise our impact on the environment while maximising the benefit to the people of the host country to whom the natural resources we are extracting belong.
Unity, Liberty, Justice
It is our corporate goal to truly work up to a meaningful community engagement: a constructive, ongoing dialogue, between the company, communities and the Government. All Monitor’s stakeholders embrace this social responsibility. Successful engagement results in positive environmental and social impacts,
people perceiving processes as inclusive and fair through ongoing consultations, engagement and consent. Monitor pursues a transparent strategy by identifying the below key factors to succeed in our meaningful community engagement.
The Technical Advisory Committee (TAC) is an organ composed by Monitor Exploration, the local company Legend Oil, and the Government represented by the Ministry of Mines and Energy (MME) and the National Oil Company (Namcor). It enables a continuous company-government relationship.
The Technical Advisory Committee unites every 6 months to take account of the company’s actions with regard to the committed work programme as well as past spenditures and approves planned expenses and next steps of the work programme.
The Technical Advisory Committee consists of different levels of Government and Company representatives to ensure coordination of actions at various levels, not only at the executive one, and explore possible collaboration and support for the industry-population rapport.
Building a trusted relationship with the local community, necessarily involves anthropological research of the Owambo region to create and embed understanding of the local context within Monitor Exploration.
The Owambo region encloses four regions: namely Ohangwena, Omusati, Oshana and Oshikoto. Around 850,000 people live here, accounting for 40% of Namibia’s population, and traditionally it is dominated by the Ovambo people, who consist of a number of kindred Bantu ethnic tribes.
It is our goal to engage local population as much as practical in field situations to ensure decision-making is sensitive to local realities.
We hire local consultants to carry out the environmental impact assessment and the environmental programme who know the local communities, their hierarchy and customs, spend time engaging with the population, tailor conclusions and recommendations to local contexts, avoiding mere standard processes.
Ethics in all its aspects is the foundation of our work.
Monitor recognizes the importance of the Community engagement as an integral part of our exploration programme in Namibia.
It is our goal to establish a long-term relationship with the community leaders and residents throughout the life-time of our work in the country.
As part of this commitment, Monitor takes active part in face-to-face meetings across the Owambo area: with regional councillors, local councillors and organises open workshops with headmen and community members.
A key objective is to provide a non-technical educative display of the planned field work within the region and comprehend people’s perturbances.
03/2022
Namibia has extraordinary young professionals, eager to learn, perform and deliver. We, at Monitor, are proud to have built a trusted business relationship with local companies for their outstanding technical capabilities and vast local knowledge.
We have embraced the opportunity to train local geologists and engineers to pass on our know-how about different exploration technologies applied its part of our work programme. Namibia qualified staff was hired during the field work and quality control of passive seismic acquisition. The local professionals were given both theoretical and practical knowledge about the technique, equipment and signal recording.
2018
The information-sharing process has at its heart development and promotion measures to increase public awareness and trust in our work and its impact on the local society and environment. We aim at providing resources to civil society organisations.
Workshops in Windhoek, Namibia.
Measuring how meaningful consultations are, and how tangible the outcomes are, is a challenge to address.
One good practice is for the involved communities themselves to evaluate the applied engagement processes and the community perceptions of our project in their region.
Naturally, this assessment can be captured and discussed at recurring company-community meetings to identify challenges on both sides, remain open and willing to learn from successes and failures, and involve everyone in problem solving.
ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT ASSESSMENT
In April 2022, the Namibian environmental consultancy company Risk-Based Solutions (RBS) concluded the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) and the Environmental Management Plan (EMP) for proposed 2D Seismic survey, covering the Areas Of Interests (AOIs) in the Owambo basin.
Monitor intends to conduct approximately 576 km long 2D seismic operations as part of the ongoing petroleum exploration programme in PEL 93.
Except for 105 km lines comprising lines 5, 8, 12 and 15 that will require new cutlines subject to the approval or request of the land owners, the rest of the other proposed survey lines will be conducted along existing roads, tracks, and farm boundary fences.
Seismic surveys are not only used for oil and gas exploration onshore and offshore but also used in the search for ground water, investigation of suitable locations for landfills and other industrials developmental facilities, and can be used to characterise how an area will shake during an earthquake.
Based on the results of the EIA, the proposed 2D seismic survey is unlikely to cause significant negative environmental impacts on the various components of the receiving environment.
Mitigation measures for both positive and negative impacts are provided in the Environmental Management Plan (already in place), including planning and mobilisation, setup and operation of campsites setups, the process of widening of existing tracks and creation of new cutlines, actual data acquisition along the individual profiles / survey lines, demobilisation, and closure and management of accidental event that may be associated with the campsite and survey lines routine and physical presence related operational stages.
