30/11/2016 by Mark
With more than two in three companies in the oil and gas sector making job cuts in 2015, there are signs that the trouble may be reaching a shifting point following a survey by Oil and Gas.
The 25th survey by Oil and Gas found that 67% of businesses in the North East Scotland area had lost staff at a quicker rate than any other time since the survey had been conducted. However, it also found that a similar number of companies were of the opinion that that the industry had reached ‘rock bottom’ and that there would now be a drop in the number of job cuts.
The Oil and Gas survey, which was conducted in September, found that operators only expect to shed a further 5% of their workforce in 2017, while contractors predict only a 1% reduction, which is much less than the 15% and 7% figures from last year.
The main reason there have been so many problems in the sector is the fact that an oversupply of oil, combined with a drop in demand, has caused oil prices to fall to extremely low levels in the past year. This is something that the Organisation of Oil Producing Countries hopes to remedy by getting its members to agree to a freeze on output. There has been resistance to this from various members, but if the deal is agreed to, it could help everyone in the sector, including the likes of Royal Dutch Shell, which makes Shell Gadus S2 V100 3.
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