The Na­tion­al Gas Com­pa­ny of Trinidad and To­ba­go Lim­it­ed (NGC) has ex­tend­ed con­grat­u­la­tions to Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar fol­low­ing the an­nounce­ment of sup­port from Unit­ed States Sec­re­tary of State Mar­co Ru­bio for the ap­proval of Of­fice of For­eign As­set Con­trol (OFAC) li­cens­es.

The li­cens­es will al­low Trinidad and To­ba­go to ad­vance the de­vel­op­ment of cross-bor­der hy­dro­car­bons, in­clud­ing the Drag­on Gas Field.

NGC ac­knowl­edged the role of the del­e­ga­tion that ac­com­pa­nied the Prime Min­is­ter, which in­clud­ed Min­is­ter of For­eign and Cari­com Af­fairs Sean Sobers, Min­is­ter of Pub­lic Util­i­ties Bar­ry Padarath, and the staff of the Of­fice of the Prime Min­is­ter. The com­pa­ny al­so recog­nised the con­tri­bu­tions of Min­is­ter of En­er­gy Roodal Mooni­lal, Min­is­ter Ernesto Ke­sar, and the staff of the Min­istry of En­er­gy.

Ac­cord­ing to NGC, the ap­proval of the li­cens­es will en­able col­lab­o­ra­tion be­tween Trinidad and To­ba­go, in­ter­na­tion­al part­ners, and the Venezue­lan gov­ern­ment to ex­plore and mar­ket gas from the Drag­on and Man­akin Cocuina fields. The com­pa­ny stat­ed that this out­come pro­vides the foun­da­tion to pur­sue oth­er cross-bor­der en­er­gy projects with Venezuela, which are ex­pect­ed to ex­pand gas sup­ply and sup­port the lo­cal en­er­gy sec­tor.

NGC Chair­man Ger­ald Ramdeen de­scribed the Prime Min­is­ter’s ef­forts as the most im­por­tant achieve­ment by a sit­ting leader to­wards na­tion­al and re­gion­al en­er­gy se­cu­ri­ty. He said the Prime Min­is­ter had ful­filled her com­mit­ment to re­store Trinidad and To­ba­go’s po­si­tion as an en­er­gy hub.

The an­nounce­ment fol­lows the re­turn of Exxon­Mo­bil to ex­plore hy­dro­car­bons in the ul­tra-deep.

NGC stat­ed it re­mains com­mit­ted to sup­port­ing the gov­ern­ment, stake­hold­ers, and Venezuela in the mon­eti­sa­tion of hy­dro­car­bon re­sources.