Sabah contributed more than quarter of the nation's crude oil last year.
Chief Minister, Datuk Seri Musa Aman said the State chipped in about 26.9 per cent of the country's overall crude oil output, which totaled more than 637,000 drums daily.
The oil and gas industry was one of the main contributors to Sabah's economic sustainability, he said, adding many large-scale projects in the sector have been developed.
"These includes the Kikeh Oil Field, which is the first offshore deepwater oil field in Malaysia and the Sabah Oil and Gas Terminal (SOGT) in Kimanis as the industry's hub in the State's West Coast," he said during the Petronas Petroleum Technology Institute (Instep) 2010 Convocation, Saturday.
"I am confident the sector has the potential to grow even further in future."
In the same breath, Musa said such development could only be achieved with skilled and experienced labour such as those produced by national oil company Petronas.
"The training programme by Petronas through Instep is a good platform to guide the younger generation to fulfill the human capital demand in this industry," he said.
The Chief Minister presented certificates to 211 Sabahan trainees who completed a two-year Petroleum Technology Programme (PTP) that started in 2007 at the Instep campus in Kuala Terengganu.
Many of the students took the one-year PTP1 course while the rest went through the two-year PTP2 that consisted of six fields namely electrical, instrumentation, mechanical, laboratory/analytical, process and distribution.
These Sabahans are part of over 1,000 trainees who completed the PTP, with the convocation here being the third held for this batch, the first being in Kuala Terengganu and the second in Miri last year.
Musa called on the graduates, a majority of them already employed with Petronas subsidiary company, Petronas Carigali Sdn Bhd, not only to respond to the industry's demands but also to propel oil and gas to be one of the core thrusts of Sabah's economic development, towards a higher income economy as envisioned in the Economic Transformation Programme.
"The State Government appreciates the commitment by Petronas to make highly skilled and competitive human capital out of Sabahans for the industry and other sectors as well," he said.
Meanwhile, Petronas Vice-President for Downstream Operations, Kamarudin Zakaria said having been introduced in 1988, the PTP1 and PTP2 have produced more than 7, 000 graduates, with almost 700 coming from Sabah.
He also said the company's technical education in the State was not only limited to Instep alone but that Petronas also ran other training programmes like installation of gas pipes at the Industrial Training Institute here and structure welding at the Commercial and Technical Training Institute in Papar, among others.
Earlier, Musa also presented the Best Student Award to Canicius Kundayis, a student in the laboratory/analytical course from Tamparuli, who earned a CGPA score of 3.87. The 23-year-old chose oil and gas as his career because of the industry's potential.
He advised those looking to make it in the industry to have a strong will, pointing out it was a challenging sector to work in.
Also present at the convocation were Petronas Sabah and Labuan General Manager, Joseph Podtung, Petronas Human Resource Management, Distribution and Development General Manager, Raiha Azni Ahd Rahman and Instep General Manager, Hj Mohd Zazali Salim.
