News and AnalysIs for

GeoPark, Equion, the OBL, OBC and Raven have all made the local news for Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) projects in oil production regions.

Casanare congressional representative Camilo Andrés Abril has called on figures in the central government to a debate on the impact of oil production in the department, alleging that very few operators are keeping promises with the local community and environment and that the government is doing little about it.

Following a meeting in Geneva, Switzerland, the USO claimed solid advances in two claims against the Colombian government and oil producers that it presented last year to the International Labor Organization (ILO).

The Colombian government’s long awaited draft decree on unconventional hydrocarbons was published last Thursday and companies will have until October 29^th to comment.

Drilling services giant Baker Hughes recently published its international counts of active drill rigs. At 36, the Colombian count has not been this low since May 2010.

Incidents near areas of interest to the oil and gas industry were back up to 32 consistent with the recent experience but slightly below the long-term average. However, non-Armed Forces incidents were well above average at 12 or 38%. This is our indicator of increased guerrilla-initiated activity. Despite the rise, our 4-week Moving Average incident count was essentially stable at 29.5 but the 52 week average dropped to was stable at 34.7 incidents per week.

This week the report from the peace talks was mostly smiles and mutual backslapping with both the Farc and former senator Piedad Cordoba praising the results achieved to date.

In the last week three successive attacks week have shut down the Caño Limon-Coveñas painting a complicated picture for transport infrastructure in areas where the ELN and Farc operate, and have also stopped Colombian gas exports to Venezuela along a separate pipeline.

As attacks against infrastructure rise, former Senator Piedad Cordoba called for a collective cease fire until Christmas and expressed support for President Juan Manuel Santos, and the Farc acknowledge advances at the negotiating table.

As part of a new strategy to increase consumption of Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) the Ministry of Mines and Energy (MinMinas) has announced a subsidy pilot program in low income communities.