Title:
EVALUATION OF SOCIAL ASPECTS OF SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPED STRATEGY IN OIL AND GAS COMPANIES IN MIDDLE EAST

Authors:
AliAsghar Sadeghi Mojarad, USA

Abstract:

Sustainability has been the focus of many researches in the past decades, and it will continue to be at the epicenter of the upcoming technological evolutions with growing consensus about climate change and environmental protection. There is no consistency among countries with respect to their commitments to the principles of sustainability. For example, Middle East region has vast oil and gas exploitation activities that are known as pollutant industries. Although the oil and gas industry has adopted some robust standards for environmental issues, the level of willingness to adopt and implement those standards vary among companies. In the absence of governmental regulations, companies are left to their leadership’s discretion to either consider sustainability in their activities or not. Needless to say, there has been great progress in introducing and enacting relevant regulations in the past two decades, but the situation is still far from ideal. Sustainable development is examined through three pillars of economic growth, ecological balance, and social progress. Social aspects are often overlooked as the consequences are not necessarily observed right away, but the society is as important as the environment. That’s why social aspect has been chosen as the focus of this research. This paper aims to highlight the issues in implementing the concept of sustainability in the Middle East region. The analysis is conducted on responses of a questionnaire with some specific questions relevant to this topic, which were filled in by employees and managers of some oil companies in this region.