The Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC) and the University of Cape Coast (UCC) Professorial Chair in Petroleum Commerce, have met with key stakeholders in the Oil & Gas industry to discuss new postgraduate courses being designed by the GNPC UCC Professorial Chair. The Doctorate (PhD), Master of Philosophy (MPhil), Master of Science (MSc) and Master of Business Administration (MBA) courses, are the result of an MOU between GNPC and UCC, to develop and coordinate graduate-level programmes in Petroleum Commerce and related fields. Once approved by the academic board, the new courses will be open to applicants in the 2021 academic year. Key stakeholders at the virtual meeting included: GNPC, Tullow Ghana, Aker Energy, Volta River Authority (VRA) Public Interest and Accountability Committee (PIAC), Energy Commission, lecturers and students, who gathered to discuss the curriculum, course structure, admission requirements, target groups and progression. The GNPC Chief Executive, Dr. K. K. Sarpong, urged UCC to collaborate with international Universities to develop pathways for students that require exposure in new technologies and findings in the oil and gas industry, in order to gain international recognition for the new courses. Dr. Kwame Baah�Nuakoh, General Manager, Sustainability & Stakeholder Relations at GNPC, emphasized the need for academia and industry to work together to develop courses, adding that "fora such as these, help to develop and train students with requisite knowledge relevant to the industry" GNPC UCC Professorial Chair, Prof. Omowumi O. Iledare, assured participants that their suggestions would be considered in the final document, which would be submitted to the academic board for consideration and final approval.

GNPC Professorial Chairs
As part of initiatives to ensure that Ghanaians take commanding heights in the Oil and Gas sector, GNPC has set up four (4) Professorial Chair(s) in the University of Ghana - Legon (UG), Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST), University of Cape Coast � (UCC), and the University of Mines and Technology (UMaT).
The Professorial Chairs were set up in 2017 by GNPC to help develop expertise and knowledge in the Petroleum sector. The Chairs are mainly research-based and are expected to specialise in various aspects of the petro-chemical business, with the objective of building local capacity and retain much needed resources in Ghana.
GNPC has committed Four Million United States Dollars ($4Million) to the four universities, with each receiving Two Hundred and Fifty Thousand Dollars per annum, over a four-year period. Disbursements have already started, and the Chairs have started working

Areas of Research
As part of the four-year agreement with the Professorial Chair, each of the four universities is expected to set up a fully-furnished, state-of-the-art laboratory to undertake petroleum research. Explaining the mandate of the Professorial Chairs, General Manager, Sustainability of GNPC, Dr. Kwame Baah - Nuakoh indicated that all the four Universities are going to focus on different areas of development in the Oil and Gas sector.
The Professorial Chair of UG will research in the area of Petroleum Geoscience, KNUST will look at Petroleum Engineering, University of Cape Coast (UCC) � Petroleum Commerce, and the University of Mines and Technology (UMaT) � Mining Engineering.