Towards Sustainable Prosperity for Host Communities: Appraisal of the Nigerian Petroleum Industry Act 2021

There have been various concerns about the petroleum industry regulation in Nigeria, including issues regarding the protection of host communities. The host communities have hardly derived sustainable developmental value from petroleum resource exploration from their community. Instead, the exploration of petroleum and other mineral resources has caused some environmental, social and economic setback for these host communities. On 17 August 2021, the Petroleum Industry Act (PIA) 2021 was signed into law after over two decades of legislative stalemate. The PIA proposes a series of reforms purported to revolutionalise the petroleum industry. According to President Buhari, the Act will create a regulatory sphere that will ensure transparency and accountability across the oil and gas value chain (Ailemen, 2021). Chapter 3 of the Act deals with host communities' concerns. Its overall aim is to ensure host communities have access to sustainable prosperity. The notion of sustainable prosperity implies that the Act seeks to elevate host communities from the poverty baseline to a level of prosperity that satisfies the social, economic, environmental and intergenerational features. Therefore, this chapter examines the provisions of the Act, particularly Chapter 3, to determine its potential to achieve sustainable prosperity for host communities. The chapter shall also identify the weaknesses in the Act, which would otherwise limit its sustainable prosperity goal and how these challenges can be addressed.