ABSTRACT
While the oil and gas industry is renowned for its efforts to identify innovative opportunities to improve exploration, development, production, and downstream technical and commercial performance, significant effort to learn from and implement innovative approaches in the social investment space has gained increased momentum since the 1990s. More recently, discussion around going beyond traditional corporate social responsibility (CSR) paradigms has intensified. One example of how industry is attempting to create greater value from social investments is the ExxonMobil-led PNG LNG Project’s (Project) efforts to first align with national priorities and then leverage workforce focused health investments to achieve higher value outcomes with respect to business priorities, community health programs and long term national health policy, and implementation outcomes. The proposed chapter will first contextualize innovation in the oil and gas industry. Subsequently, the chapter will detail the key health-related initiatives designed and implemented by ExxonMobil in PNG, to include key planning and implementation challenges and successes, plus a look forward as to how investments to date can be leveraged further. Key lessons learned for consideration both within PNG and industry engagement globally will be put forward.
