Link to Atlas Project

Documents

Overview

Ghana is in the process of developing its Country Mining Vision (CMV).The African Mining Vision (AMV), to which Ghana seeks to align its CMV, seeks to foster “a transparent, equitable and optimal exploitation of mineral resources to underpin broad-based sustainable growth and socio-economic development.” Amongst other objectives, the AMV encompasses a focus on promoting “a sustainable and well-governed mining sector that effectively garners and deploys resource rents and that is safe, healthy, gender and ethnically inclusive, environmentally friendly, socially responsible and appreciated by surrounding communities;” and “a mining sector that harnesses the potential of artisanal and small-scale mining (ASM) to stimulate local/national entrepreneurship, improve livelihoods and advance integrated rural social and economic development.”

In the AMV, the focus on ASM is seen as complementing the hitherto predominant focus in many countries on the Large-Scale Mining (LSM) sector, such that, going forward, ASM and LSM can co-exist in a mutually beneficial fashion. Given ASM’s positive role in providing livelihood opportunities and generating purchasing power at the local level, the focus is on strengthening the developmental treatment of ASM in the regulatory environment and development strategies while addressing the poverty-cycle that many ASM miners are trapped in, as well as the various social and environmental sustainability challenges affecting the sector.

This social analysis of ASM is aimed at informing the work of the UN and contributing to Ghana’s policies and strategies focused on the ASM sector and the CMV process, with a view to shedding light on the social sustainability dimensions and challenges.