North Dakota looks to Ukraine to fill oilfield jobs

BISMARCK — A gaggle representing oil and pure fuel corporations in North Dakota is beginning to look hundreds of miles away for individuals to fill jobs within the state’s oilfields.

The North Dakota Petroleum Council plans to convey employees from Ukraine to the Bakken area as a part of a brand new program referred to as Bakken GROW (World Recruitment of Oilfield Employees), a response to the state’s workforce scarcity.

The recruitment might be coordinated by way of the brand new Uniting for Ukraine (U4U) streamlined immigration course of that gives Ukrainian residents fleeing Russia’s invasion a chance to come back to the U.S. and work.

“They want our assist. We’d like their assist,” mentioned Ron Ness, president of NDPC.

The North Dakota Petroleum Council plans to welcome the primary 25 new employees from Ukraine to North Dakota by July.

The employees will obtain security coaching by way of the One Basin, One Method! Program, adopted by orientation and neighborhood acclimation by way of their employer inside their first few days of arriving in western North Dakota.

Former Lt. Gov. Brent Sanford has been employed because the mission supervisor of Bakken GROW. Sanford had served as lieutenant governor from 2016 till January of this yr.

Sanford would be the lead liaison between member corporations and immigration recruitment companies to assist in the method of bringing employees to North Dakota.

“The Bakken GROW program is a humanitarian mission and a workforce resolution,” Sanford mentioned.

Gov. Doug Burgum’s workplace mentioned the recruitment of employees domestically and internationally is per the state’s complete efforts to deal with North Dakota’s workforce challenges.

“Former Lt. Gov. Sanford’s intimate involvement within the state’s workforce efforts, alongside along with his deep background of working with the oil and fuel business and recruiting and welcoming employees from exterior North Dakota as mayor of Watford Metropolis, make him ideally suited to steer the GROW initiative,” the workplace mentioned in an announcement.

Bakken GROW relies partly on the expertise of an immigrant recruiting agency in Alaska, which has discovered employees from Ukraine who’re exempt from preventing of their house nation, have superior training levels and are searching for good-paying jobs to assist their households again house.

A whole bunch of immigrant employees from Ukraine have discovered employment in Alaska within the final 12 months, working for oil drilling and seafood processing corporations.

Every U4U immigrant should have a sponsor or supporter earlier than they’ll come to america.

The North Dakota Petroleum Council is searching for people who’re keen to function sponsors.

A hyperlink to a sponsor questionnaire could be discovered right here.

As soon as the primary group of immigrant employees is positioned with their member employers, the Bakken GROW course of can be utilized to recruit employees from different international locations as effectively.

“Our member corporations have been struggling to seek out employees inside North Dakota and throughout the nation for the previous few years, so we felt we wanted to create an modern manner to answer our business’s challenges of discovering employees by way of authorized immigration,” Ness mentioned.

Huebner is a 35+ yr veteran of broadcast and print journalism in Fargo-Moorhead.