Saudi Arabia International Oil and Gas Exhibition and Conference (SAOGE), the Kingdom’s largest oil and gas exhibition, has this year launched a new ‘Industry meets University’ initiative in support of Saudization program.

The second edition of the top oil and gas event, which runs from November 1 to 4, will see over 250 exhibitors from 30 countries taking part.

The 250 plus exhibitors make up several leading oil & gas corporations in their home countries and around the world, and this global participation at SAOGE is a testament of the event’s growing significance and importance, said the organsiers, IES Srl.

Lorenzo Casati, CEO of EniRepSa Gas Limited in Saudi Arabia will be chairing a panel discussion on development technologies for current exploration and production projects and their significance to the sector globally.

KPMG Al Fozan & Al Sadhan Director, Tim Rockell will also be chairing a session on the impact and challenges of the decreasing oil prices and exploration potential for oil & gas in the Middle East.

Panelists in this session include Christof Rühl, chief economist, BP and Alain Panhard, manager, Finance & Corporate Support, South Rub Al-Khali Company Limited (SRAK).

SAOGE’s newly-launched ‘Industry meets University’ initiative aims at encouraging Saudization by giving local students the opportunity to have an active presence at the exhibition.

Under this initiative, students from the most prominent universities in the region focusing on Oil and Gas and Engineering will be given a tour of the Exhibition, which contains over 250 private and public companies participating this year.

Students will be also be given an opportunity to ask questions and present their view of the industry to a number of the major operators and contractors represented during the conference.

This will be followed by specialists and key decision-makers having direct interaction with the students to provide them with the tools they would require to better understand more about the career opportunities available to them in the Kingdom.

Piero Zipoli, president of IES Srl, said ‘We recently launched this forum at our Offshore Mediterranean Conference and found that both industry and the students benefited greatly – so the SAOGE Committee felt that to host a similar forum and tie-in with the Kingdoms Saudization plans would offer equal benefits.’-TradeArabia News Service