August 10, 2020|RAZORNEWS
With a corporate vision “to be a leading energy products and services company,” Rainoil Limited is truly living up to its mission which is “to provide energy products and services in an efficient and sustainable manner while creating superior value for all stakeholders.” There is no better evidence to this, than the recent commissioning of its Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) plant at her multi-product facility in Ijegun, Lagos.
The LPG business trading as ‘Rainoil Gas’ kicked off operations with a tank capacity of 8000MT (Metric Tonnes) and a fleet of 40 LPG tank trucks to ensure distribution of products to bulk-buying customers who own LPG filling plants. The ‘Rainoil Gas’ will also meet the energy needs of customers at the retail end in the coming months as Management of the Rainoil Group is already putting in place filling plants where LPG can be supplied in cylinders to customers.
This current effort is obviously in tandem with the feelings of Rainoil Limited Managing Director, Dr. Gabriel Ogbechie who believes that the expansion in the company’s activities perfectly aligns with its vision and mission to continually proffer solutions in filling the voids in the energy sector.
With a projected LPG market size of $10 billion globally and Nigeria having the fastest growing LPG sector with the domestic demand seeing an increase of 40%, Rainoil Gas is poised to support the Federal Government’s policy on deepening LPG penetration and hopes to improve domestic consumption of LPG in the various states of the federation. The business is also expected to increase the domestic storage flexibility of LPG.
With the commencement of its LPG activities, Rainoil has set the stage to offer more direct and indirect employment opportunities including training, skills acquisition, transfer and enhancement even as the company management has promised that its operations will also have an added environmental protection benefit as it reduces gas flaring and encourage the use of cleaner fuels.
What this means is a robust improvement in the entire value chain of a company which has its humble beginning some twenty years ago. Rainoil Limited was incorporated in November, 1994 and commenced business as a petroleum products marketing company in May, 1997. It has remained a wholly indigenous company and a recognized operator in the downstream oil and gas industry. Since its commencement of operation, the company under the able leadership of Dr. Gabriel Ogbechie; an engineer by profession, has steadily become a prominent player in the Nigerian oil and gas industry.
The company has continued to increase its capacity in the entire value chain of the oil and gas downstream sector with encouraging evidence in petroleum product storage, haulage/distribution and retail sales. The company’s primary products until recently with the addition of Liquified Petroleum Gas (LPG) have included Petrol (PMS), Diesel (AGO) and Kerosene (DPK).
Rainoil Limited assets base has also grown in the last 20 years and these include Bulk storage facilities. The company has three ultra-modern petroleum product storage depots in Calabar Free Trade Zone, Ijegun Lagos and Oghara in Delta State. Each of them has a multi-product capacity of 50 million litre. Its retails services currently extend to 81 outlets spread across the country with filling stations strategically located in major cities such as Lagos, Abuja, Kaduna, Port Harcourt, Calabar, Uyo, Enugu, Onitsha, Asaba, Makurdi, Sapele, Lafia, Keffi and so on.
To make products distribution easier, Rainoil has also invested so much in tank trucks that have the resilient capacity to meet up with distribution schedules. Currently, the company has more than 100 tank trucks in its fleet largely devoted to the distribution of its primary products of petrol, diesel and kerosene. At the recent commissioning of the Liquefied Petroleum Gas facility, about 40 tank trucks were also launched to lift LPG products and meet up with the overall logistics requirements in product distribution. The fleet is frequently renewed through a deliberate truck acquisition policy. It is therefore obvious that within the next few years, more trucks would have been added going by the history of tank trucks acquisition of a company which began operation with less than ten trucks in its fleet.
With a well focused and committed management in place, Rainoil has also acquired a shipping vessel for its marine services with a total carrying capacity of over 20,000 metric tonnes of petroleum products. With its record of achievements so far, it is quite evident that Rainoil is living up to its core values which hinge on Respect, Integrity, Teamwork, Excellence and Safety.
Besides its increasing great role in the oil and gas downstream sector, Rainoil group over the years, has continued to advertise itself as a good corporate citizen by constantly giving back to society. Its commitment to corporate social responsibility over the years has remained legendary as evident in its annual sponsorship of Rainoil Tennis Open Tournament.
With a great passion, the company has continued to spend huge amounts in the sponsorship of Tennis championship in the past eleven years. In 2019 alone, the company spent well over N18million in hosting the annual edition of the Rainoil Tennis Open. Apart from the money spent in hosting the week-long activities to the grand finale at the Lagos Country Club, winners at the event had gone home with mouth watering packages.
Twenty-three year old Sylvester Emmanuel had emerged the overall winner at the grand finale and went home with N500,000 prize money while Morocco based Oyinlomo Quadre who came out winner in the female category was given N300,000 in addition to other prizes she had won in the contest.
Rainoil Group Managing Director, Dr. Gabriel Ogbechie who spoke to journalists soon after the presentation of prizes to winners in different categories, at that event had said, “I am personally passionate about Tennis. I play Tennis. Rainoil Limited has always identified with Tennis. We have sponsored Tennis for more than ten years now on annual basis. In this year’s tournament, we must have put in more than N20million in sponsorship. For us, we believe it is money well spent and we need to develop tennis in Nigeria.”
True to his assertion, Ogbechie’s Rainoil Limited in 2015 or thereabout had single-handedly given Sylvester Emmanuel a 90,000 dollar sponsorship to go abroad and play Tennis. He was sent to a Tennis Academy in Barcelona and not only did the company commit the money to him, Ogbechie personally travelled to Barcelona just to see him where he was training, all due to the passion the company’s management has for the game.
Talking about passion behind the sponsorship of the Rainoil Tennis Open, Ogbechie would want to tell anyone who cares to listen that the desire to change the socio-economic status of people largely underlines the passion as he would audaciously say that “tennis is a game through which our young ones can come not just out of poverty but make a lot of wealth for themselves. When we look at the tennis world and talk about the Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic, each of them has earned more 100 million dollars for just playing tennis. So there is a lot of gain in tennis. We have young boys and girls coming up in tennis in Nigeria” he said at the last year’s Rainoil Tennis Open event.
As part of his company’s corporate social responsibility, the Rainoil boss and his management team have not relented in remembering the less privileged ones in the society during such occasions as Christmas and New Year celebrations. December last year also, the team played host to over one thousand children from Idumuje-Ugboko, Onicha Ugbo, Issele-Uku and other neigbhouring towns as a way of identifying with the less privileged class in the society.
The children, some of whom were accompanied by their mothers were lavishly entertained at the party which took place at the country home of the Group Managing Director at Idumuje-Ugboko in Aniocha North Local Government Area of Delta State. The kids were hosted on the platform of Gabriel Ogbechie Foundation. Speaking at that occasion, Mrs. Godrey Ogbechie who is the Group Executive Director of the Rainoil Group had said, “this is a season of giving. We find joy in bringing smiles to faces of hundreds of these kids. The planning was hectic but we thank God, that everything came out well.”
Apart from feeding the children with assorted types of food and entertaining them with mascots and other fun games, the children also went home with beautiful packs containing other interesting items.
Still in line with its passion to continuously be a good corporate citizen, Rainoil Limited in collaboration with other downstream operators in Delta State under the consortium platform of Petroleum Tank Farm Owners early this year, in the heat of the Covid-19 pandemic lockdown donated two ambulances and N100million medical equipment to Delta State Government. The ambulances were fully fitted with ventilators, and other equipment include 15 hospital beds, face masks, goggles, coveralls and so on.
With the recent official commissioning of its LPG facilities in Ijegun Lagos, by Nigeria’s Minister of State for Petroleum, Chief Timipre Sylva and top management staff of the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), it has become more evident that Rainoil Limited is not a pedestrian player in the oil and gas downstream sector. It has become a national brand working seriously to ultimately become a global brand in the industry and gas industry in the nearest future.