Vandana Gangaram Panday is the Director of Staatsolie Hydrocarbon Institute, tasked with fulfilling Staatsolie’s (the NOC of Suriname) regulatory duties. In this role, she is responsible for promoting Suriname's offshore acreage to the E&P industry, concluding, and managing production sharing contracts with international oil companies, and offshore data. Vandana has over 20 years of experience within Staatsolie’s value chain, with a track record in petroleum law and policy, strategy and corporate planning, contract negotiations and management, project economics, and regulatory affairs. Her academic background includes a M.Sc. in systems engineering, policy analysis and management from TU Delft, the Netherlands, a postgraduate in petroleum engineering from TNO/TU Delft, and a LL.M. in mineral law & policy from the University of Dundee, Scotland.