Lifting Ban On Small-Scale Mining: Let Us Provide Alternative Income-Generating Opportunities For Galamsayers And Rural Communities Quickly Instead

There is a need  to provide galamsayers and rural communities affected by illegal activities that impact ecosystems negatively, with alternative micro-entrepreneurial opportunities.

And before the ban on small-scale gold mining is lifted, forensic audits ought to be conducted into the operations of small-scale gold mining companies across Ghana.

Ditto investigations into how they came to obtain their concessions and operating permits - since it is an open secret that most small-scale gold  miners obtained them through corrupt means.

Thus far, the most sensible observation about the many illegalities going on in the egregious degradation of what is left of our nation's natural heritage, has come from the Asantehene - who is of the view that the work of the regulatory bodies ought to be examined closely if the fight against such environmentally ruinous activities is to be won.

And how right he is: Were the media spotlight to be focused on auditing the work of the officials employed by the regulatory bodies that oversee our forests, mineral deposits and water resources - at both the district and national levels - one doubts very much that any legally registered small-scale gold mining concern would be allowed to operate in Ghana.

As we speak, for example, apparently tailings ponds of Kibi Goldfields sited in what is a buffer zone - are reported to have been breached and said to be leaching toxic material into the Akoosu stream. Monstrous.

And despite the Forestry Commission's district-level officials having been notified, trees are still being felled regularly (and turned into bush-cut chainsaw lumber that will somehow be transported to their buyers in Accra), in the heavily forested slopes of the Atewa Range's upland evergreen rainforest's Akyem Juaso section. Abominable.

The plain truth is that many of the officials employed by the regulatory bodies to enforce their regulations and laws on the ground across Ghana are in the pockets of the criminal syndicates behind the destruction of what is left of Ghana's natural heritage.

If it wasn't for the bribes the syndicates readily pay to such dishonest officials to turn a blind eye to their crimes against Mother Nature, no small-scale mining company in Ghana would be able to obtain concessions, permits and, above all, none of their Environmental Impact Assessment documents would be sanctioned by the EPA after site visits and community engagement consultations.

Finally, since Ghana  has signed on to implementing measures to enable the nation attain all the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030, perforce we  must provide rural people - including galamsayers - with the training to set up alternative income generating micro-enterprises, such as mushroom farming, beekeeping to produce honey, snail farming, grasscutter rearing and community agro-forestry initiatives.

The Rural Enterprises Project (REP) needs to be resourced to help train rural people to do all the above. Ditto the NGOs and private vocational schools that provide skills training for young females. Quickly.