According to a report by the Comptroller General of Ecuador, "the information collected on oil spills in the Amazon District of Petroleum Production does not show the date and time of the incidents, their state, actions taken, the affected property, or the total contaminated surface".

The Petroleum Production is the subsidiary of the Nation’s Company of Ecuador Petroleum which is responsible for the "exploitation of sedimentary basins and the work of hydrocarbon fields within the Ecuadorian territory, which includes the exploitation and transportation of crude oil and gas to the main tanks storage”.

The audit highlighted the lack of information about how the oil spills began, totaling 712 between October 2005 and November 2008. They also noted in the documentation provided by the company that "in many cases the spills were not solved immediately and in many of them, they do not include the date on which the incident ended."

However, "the executive reports indicate that the spills as well as the cleaning were resolved directly or through the recruitment of qualified firms," which "contradicts" the information found by the Comptroller indicating that even today, some spills remain "pending". When the watchdog found this information they were surprised since the original purpose of the report was "to examine the purchases and uses of materials and equipment used in oil spills."

And Now, The Purchasing

To make necessary purchases to address the oil spills, Petroecuador allocated 4,864,473 dollars. In relation, the Comptroller stated that "no information or complete documentation identifying the delivery and use of emergency and cleaning items, whose value amounts to $799,128 dollars".

There are also goods for $282,534 that "if properly described in orders were not delivered in total to the requesting unit" and cases where "the identity of the people who took the material and the reasons they used them was never found”.

Made In Ecuador

On the purchase of domestic materials, auditors found a lack of sufficient documentation as to evaluate the procurement and delivery of items made in Petroleum Production. However, it was detected repeatedly that from when the goods were requested until they entered the cellar "-long periods of time passed, sometimes exceeding two months- even though they were local purchases and in small amounts." In fact, there was a case in which "the materials were received four years and six months after the established deadline".

Direct Charge

Some absorbent materials and equipment were not recorded and placed in stock but were delivered directly to the areas that needed the order, in the form of a direct charge. More importantly, the Comptroller found "no evidence that Petroleum Production had a legal basis that attributed applicants to purchase materials through this matter." In addition, "there is no planning in the procurement of goods and machinery to fulfill the needs of the Amazon District, which means that some elements remained in storage for more than five years without being used."

A Matter Of Pricing

To carry out their tasks each unit requests the purchase of inputs for which the organization has a price guide for each. However, "these values are not current with the market" because "the system records the date and price of the last purchase beyond the date that a purchase has been made." In order to try to solve this problem, the "Market Intelligence" was created; they are responsible for "updating those prices”. However, at the end of the audit, the problem still persisted.