A three-day workshop on the Geopolitics of Energy and Climate Change in Latin America concluded on Sunday at Cara Lodge in Georgetown, drawing participation from local journalists and communications students from the University of Guyana.
The event, which took place from Friday, June 27, to Sunday, June 29, was organized by the California-based Institute of the Americas and led in Georgetown by its Vice President for Energy and Sustainability, Jeremy Martin. The workshop formed part of the Institute’s broader efforts to build capacity among journalists and promote dialogue on energy and climate issues.
Speaking with OilNOW at the start of the session, Martin said the purpose of the workshop “is all about journalists having more access to information about energy and climate – the issues around energy, what are the trends, what are the developments”.
This is the first time the program has been introduced in Guyana. Martin believes this move was timely: “This is a very unique workshop, not just because we are in Guyana, but we are actually bringing a journalist to start the workshop.”
He added, “We’ve never done that; we’ve only done it with energy experts, subject matter experts, and we’ve done it at the Institute in San Diego.” Martin said that while several Guyanese journalists have participated over the years, they wanted to reach a broader audience within the Guyanese media, making the program more accessible.
“What we realised is we could only bring two or three journalists at a time… so we said, well, why don’t we bring the presenters here and we can open it up to 35 or 40 journalists as we have done right now.” Martin said to expect more programs like these to be brought to Guyana’s shores.
Over the three days, participants were taken through a series of high-level presentations by international experts, including Institute Fellows and officials from ExxonMobil. Discussions focused on journalism best practices, global energy trends, climate policy, and the evolving dynamics of Latin America’s oil and gas sector. The petroleum industries of countries like Venezuela and Brazil served as case studies for examining the forces shaping energy development in the region.
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The training also featured a roster of seasoned professionals who brought a diversity of perspectives. Among them were Betsy Fischer-Martin, Executive Director of the Women and Politics Institute at American University and former Emmy-winning Journalist and Executive Producer of NBC’s Meet the Press; John Gentry from ExxonMobil’s Corporate Strategic Planning team; and Valerie Marcel, Executive Director of the New Producers for Sustainable Energy.
Participants also heard from Diego Mesa, Distinguished Visiting Fellow at Columbia University’s Center for Global Energy Policy and former Colombian Minister of Mines and Energy; Nelson Narciso, a Non-Resident Fellow at the Institute and former Director at Brazil’s oil and gas regulator ANP; and David Voght, Managing Director at IPD Latin America.
The Georgetown workshop builds on earlier engagements between the Institute and journalists from the region, including more limited sessions held alongside the La Jolla Energy Conference on the University of California, San Diego’s campus.
Participants were presented with certificates upon concluding a weekend of in-depth learning and robust discussion.
