Baffour Asare Yamoah
COORDINATOR OF the Chamber of Small-Scale Mining Industry in Ghana (COSSMIG), Baffour Asare Yamoah, has called for the development of special codes for various minerals exported out of the country to help Government account for all minerals exploited from all parts of the country.
According to him, this presents an alternative means of revenue generation that will complement the E-Levy which is still before Parliament for the country’s development.
He said Ghana loses lots of revenue from minerals due to unaccounted mineral exports from the various districts and regions.
Speaking in an interview in Accra, he indicated that, though the E-Levy if implemented would support the economy, other revenue generating activities in the mining sector which are left untapped, could be considered owing to the huge sums of money that go unaccounted for.
He stated “All the minerals exported should have specialised codes, government should know where each mineral is mined from especially at the districts level. And Government should be able to account for every Cedi generated for development purposes to avoid a situation where mining proceeds goes to individuals.”
He also indicated that though every mining activity was supposed to generate some revenue to the state, Ghana has not received any substantial benefit from such mining areas as a result of mining by individuals.
He therefore proposed cooperative mining as one of the immediate measures to raise additional stream of revenue for the state and an opportunity to attract both local and foreign investors into small scale mining.
He further proposed that mining vehicles such as excavators could have special stickers for them to pay a fee to government through the various district assemblies to augment their internally generated fund for local development.
“Cooperative mining will create employment for the indigenes in the communities, create a sense of belongingness, make them accountable to each other, and more importantly, help generate money for the state. Reclamation of the land will not be a difficult thing for them to do” he emphasised.
Mr. Yamoah said that for such measures to be achieved, graduates with environmental backgrounds and technically inclined could be employed to do proper prospecting to adopt best practices “in order to use these lands for farming purposes after using them for mining.”
COSSMIG as a chamber is mandated by law to regulate the activities of all forms of mining such as salt winning and mineral ore, among others.
BY Ebenezer K. Amponsah