Topic: Impact and Safety of Deep Water Drilling
Country: Morocco
Delegate Name: Samantha Pollee
School: Mattawan High School
Topic page: background guide and all position papers All Morocco position papers GLIMUN 2010 committees
Oil drilling has recently increased exploration in the countries of Western Africa such as the Ivory Coast, Nigeria, and Cameroon due to the increasing demand from nations around the world. The deposits in these countries are added on top of the greatest oil producers in the Middle East. The Kingdom of Morocco, however, is an exception. Even though it is located on the west coast along with Western Sahara, Morocco is responsible for nearly no petroleum drilling off of the coast. With such little exploration and drilling, the country relies on 95% of its energy to come from imports. In the 1970’s one of Morocco’s main exports, phosphate, quadrupled in price; thus, the rises in oil prices were offset by the extreme revenue. In present day, phosphate does not have as much worth, but oil is still imported in great amounts. Because Morocco wishes to rely less on imports, it has very recently decided as of December 1, 2010 to sign three oil/gas exploration deals within the next month. This comes in efforts to attract foreign companies to exploring the coasts, all in order to increase its energy supply circuit. Though the Kingdom of Morocco is not currently widely recognized for its oil production, it has large amounts of potential to rise up with the other major producers of western Africa.
Along with its fellow nearby countries, Morocco feels that strict regulations on rigs are unnecessary. Since Morocco is already incredibly dependent on imported oil, helping the country is all that matters. Morocco understands the environmental risks of oil rigs, but believes that for the benefit of the economy, it is more advantageous to build the rigs than to not at all. Issues such as spills, leaks, air pollution, and animal safety are crucial issues in the debate of drilling, but Morocco feels that they are of less importance.
As a final resolution, Morocco wishes to see rigs built on its coast. Along with this, strict regulations are not of importance. There should only be a minimum amount of input regarding the regulations of the oil rigs. Even though the consequences have potential to be extremely damaging, when the rigs are created, they should be installed with safe measures. If errors are erased in the first place, there is no need to continue a follow up. In short, Morocco wishes to increase the amount of rigs in areas that have been mapped out for potential. These rigs would help the Kingdom of Morocco rely less on foreign companies to supply their energy needs, and in turn it would help supply more exports, greatly enhancing the Moroccan economy.
