The Jakarta Convention Center was once again filled with the Oil and Gas industry communities when the 4^th International Indonesia CBM (IndoCBM) Conference & Exhibition was officially opened by for two days on 18^th - 19^th April which started with a Business Forum attended by high level participants from the Government as regulators and the PSCs.

The event which has the theme of  "Indonesia's Emerging CBM: Keys to Sustainable Growth" attracted a lot of participants from domestic as well as overseas.  The opening ceremony on Wednesday, 18 April 2012, was colorful with welcoming dance of  "Ondel Ondel" Jakarta's traditional dance to welcome visitors was performed.  The opening ceremony was also marked with the signing ceremony of 8 (eight) new CBM PSCs and CBM gas selling and purchase agreement between VICO and PT PLN (Persero).  VICO as the main sponsor of the 4^th IndoCBM Conference & Exhibition involved in the program as the Organizing Committee with Bambang Ismanto (Vice President Resource Management) as Chairman, Hazman (CBM Sub Surface Manager) as Member and Lies Tjokro (General Affairs & Services Manager) as the Reception Sub- Committee Chairman, also Bina Yuanita (General Affairs Section Head) as member of the Reception Sub-Committee.  On the speakers' and panelists' side, VICO also sent representatives such as Chris Allen (Sr. Manager CBM Project) as one of the Panelists to the panel discussion on CBM Development in Action: Opportunities and Challenges, Julfrida Nababan (Environmental Engineer) as one of the Panelists to the panel discussion on "Managing Environmental Issues" and lastly Ahmad F. Hadad (Reservoir Engineer) as one of the Speakers to the Technical Session "CBM Operations: Implementation and Challenges".

Beside those involvements at the technical sessions, VICO also has a booth to exhibit best practice at the Conference.  A presentation on the CBM technical and environmental program was conducted at the booth by our CBM engineers.  The late Prof. Widjajono Partowidagdo, Ph.D, Deputy Minister of Energy and Mineral Resources of the Republic of Indonesia and the VIP entourage visited the booth. 

At the Keynote Speech, H.E. Minister Energy and Mineral Resources, Jero Wacik, expressed that he is fully aware of the issues surrounding the CBM exploration and production in Indonesia although this is a new subject to the industry.  But he is hopeful that the presentations and discussions at the Conference will result in valuable input towards the adoption of the business models and technology developments to accelerate commercialization of Indonesia's CBM resources.

VICO will continue to complete the work commitments we have made to the Government of Indonesia.  For VICO this is not a dream... it is a mission.

This is the first note for VICO web since I have been appointed as the new President & CEO from VICO on 1 April 2012 replacing Craig Stewart and I am really looking forward to the challenges and opportunities of the role.

My vision for VICO's future is to carry the legacy left by the predecessors, world class safety for our people and operations and an exciting future for our business, our people and Indonesia. 

I would first like to start by thanking Pak Craig Stewart for his leadership during the last three years and his personal commitment to VICO. Of his many achievements I would like to mention VICO's Operations Excellence Management System (OEMS), which he personally championed. OEMS will be the foundation of VICO and it will help us all to do our jobs more effectively and continuously improve. I intend to ensure that OEMS becomes fully embedded into our daily lives and that the "The Spirit of Excellence" is something we all endeavor to achieve and be proud of.

My key priorities for today and for the future are built on People, Plant, Procedures and Performance.

People

Without people we have no business so it will be my first priority. I will be placing a strong emphasis on personal safety and will be building on processes we already have such as the Three Safety Golden Rules and our Eight Safety Standards. Staff development will also be my priority and I want to see structured training and development plans established for all staff and meaningful succession planning.

Plant

My top priority with our field operations will be to ensure that we have no process safety issues. What this means is that we do not have an incident due to inadequate design, poor operational competence or lack of maintenance where hydrocarbons are released with serious consequences. Simply put process safety means keeping our oil & gas contained behind pipe and managed.

Procedures

There are many procedures I could mention but the key one to implement is Operations Excellence Management System (OEMS), which is our foundation. We also need to ensure that in our business dealings we act and behave with integrity so Code of Conduct (CoC) and Anti-Bribery and Corruption (ABC) are processes that will help us realize these goals.

Performance

During the tenure of my leadership I will ensure that VICO's performance is on line with the work program and budget approved.  I want to make sure we spend the money wisely to ensure that we receive budget funding from our owners and that our spending is well managed and controlled so that every dollar we spend brings value.

So what would success look like?

Simply put we have no accidents, no harm to people and no damage to the environment.  I will not be working alone to achieve all of the above for VICO without your participations, VICO employees and contractors alike and as one of the PSCs of BPMIGAS, of course we will be looking for the support and guidance from the Government of Indonesia.

VICO has achieved many things over many years and we are proud of those achievements.  So thank you for welcoming me into the VICO family. I am both excited and proud to be working for such a great company.

Ministry of Environment (KLH) presented awards to the VICO laboratory located at Badak, East Kalimantan. VICO laboratory is perceived to have met the requirements to obtain the Registration Certificate of Competence of Environmental Laboratories according to the Minister of Environment Regulation No. 06 of 2009 on the Environmental Laboratory. The representative from KLH, Hendri Bustaman, Deputy Environment VI Communication and Empowerment of Communities to give the certificate and received by Craig Stewart, President & CEO of VICO. The awarding ceremony was held on Wednesday, March 7, 2012 in the Board room VICO Indonesia.

In addition to the award of the Ministry of Environment, in the event VICO also obtained an award for the additional scope of accreditation of ISO 17025:2005.  Previously, VICO laboratory accredited to ISO 17025:2005 for Gas analyses in June 2010 from the National Accreditation Committee (KAN). This year, VICO obtained additional scope of accreditation for the produced water and wastewater research. This achievement is the first in the oil and gas industry and prove the efficiency and operating costs. The certificate of additional accreditation of ISO 17025 was given by Suprapto, Secretary General of the National Accreditation Committee and accepted symbolically by  Parluhutan Sibuea, VP HSES & OID VICO.

This event was also attended by  Rudi Rubiandini, Deputy Operations BPMIGAS. He revealed that a reliable lab is very important in protecting the environment, especially for VICO as a laboratory coordinator for East Kalimantan gas producers. This is a good achievement for VICO Indonesia and hopefully in future, with the competency of VICO Laboratory, it could also increase the VICO production to become higher. Meanwhile, Hendri Bustaman, Deputy Environment VI Communication and Empowerment of Communities revealed that currently there were 34 new laboratory to receive accreditation for the environmental category, one of which is VICO, and there are only 3 in East Kalimantan. Therefore, KLH expect that in the future, VICO will serves as a reference laboratory of the environmental analysis for the other companies around.

Congratulations to the VICO Laboratory team Badak- OID for this proud achievement.

A modest, simple and kind person telling us her long experience of pioneering the business from zero up to now which has become quite a successful entrepreneur in sub district Muara Jawa. Ibu Pujiati, with almost crying, she kept saying thank you and grateful for her better life. Since the assistance extended by VICO in 2005, Ibu Pujiati has successfully develops the initial capital provided by VICO. Now, she became one of the famous entrepreneurs in Muara Jawa. Flagship product such as shrimp crackers and various kinds of snacks has been a favorite of local and immigrant communities.

The persistence on running her small enterprise making Ibu Pujiati also often invited as a trainer or resource person in various training and seminar. She would gladly share her knowledge to others. Her aim is to look for everyone around her so they could be also successful.

The work done by Ibu Pujiati finally received the appreciation at the national level. On January 25, 2012, Ibu Pujiati and VICO Indonesia represented by Parluhutan Sibuea, VP HSES & OI, received the UMKM AWARD 2011. VICO Indonesia and Ibu Pujiati regarded as a successful example in terms of local community development undertaken by the company.

UMKM Award is an annual event held by Seputar Indonesia. In the event, which was also attended by Minister of Cooperatives and SMEs, Syarifuddin Hasan, the UMKM Award 2011 was also awarded to some young entrepreneurs and other PSCs who are successful with their trained community partners.

The year 2012 opened with VICO launching the promotion and campaign program for HSE & Operations Excellence Management System (OEMS). In Jakarta,  this activity was held on January 10 and was attended by Craig Stewart as President & CEO, Parluhutan Sibuea as VP HSES&OI, Lies Tjokro as the Chairman of Jakarta Facility Operations Excellence  Committee and Henry Simanjuntak as the Project Manager OEMS. This program was participated by the Jakarta Facility Operations Excellence Committee members which consist of HSE Representatives, Floor Wardens, Security and Drivers representatives and Services Team who are mainly high safety risk in their jobs.

The main agenda of this campaign in Jakarta Office was a reading of commitment from Drivers, Office Boys, and Securities by their representatives, to be aware that work accident will not only occurs in the field, but also could occur in Jakarta. VICO expects that by reading of the statement of commitment, the implementation of OEMS can be truly understood and implemented by all workers especially those who have high risk jobs.

Similar activities were earlier simultaneously held on January 1 in Badak, Nilam, Semberah, Mutiara and 5 rig locations. The events were attended by all workers at Operations Area and each was chaired by each local Facility's Operations Excellence Committee Chairman or manager.

The main purpose of the whole launching and promotion program is to improve and increase the spirit of excellence in HSE and promoting the OEMS to all VICO's workers including the contractors.  OEMS is a management systems in implementing a good system to achieve a world class performance in all areas of operations. VICO expects that by implementing the OEMS program, there will be no accidents, no harm to humans, and no damage to the environment. We all have a responsibility to help achieve this goal.