The Minerals Income Investment Fund (MIIF) has disclosed that Ghana loses over GH¢50 million annually in royalties from quarry.
According to MIIF, this due the country’s over-concentration on gold resources.
The Chief Executive Officer of MIIF, Edward Nana Yaw Koranteng revealed this at the opening of the 2022 Ghana Mining Week and Gold Expo in Takoradi.
He further explained that quarry should be giving Ghana around GH¢100 million royalties annually, but Ghana only realised just GH¢ 3.8milllion in 2020.
“92% of our royalties are coming from gold, so there is a leaning towards gold because that is where we have our most royalties. So, that is the problem. If you look at the quarry sector, it is in line with our economic and infrastructure development. So as far as you have infrastructure and economic development growing, there should be a corresponding increase in its royalties. We are supposed to have about, GH¢100million in royalties annually. In a worst-case scenario, we should have at least GH¢35 million to GH¢ 56 million but in 2020 we had only GH¢3.6 million which means there is a big problem with the quarries“, he said.
He indicated that as part of ways to address the issue, “We have identified four main problems with the quarries including invasion by foreigners, underpricing, lack of capital and encroachment by settlers within the catchment of quarries. If we have to expand the royalties net and add value to the quarries sector, then we need to properly strategize. So for me to get GH¢100 million royalties annually from the quarries, there are a few things we are doing now. Thus, we are trying to support the quarry sector by introducing what we call de-risking mechanisms, which is essential to provide guarantees to banks that desire to support the quarry sector“, he added.
“Our research shows that there is a huge potential in the other mineral sector. Quarry is one and salt is another. There are only two countries, Ghana and Senegal that have the potential to provide industrial salt, but Nigeria keeps bypassing us to Brazil to bring salt to support their petroleum industry. The potential of salt considering the fact that gold is more finite makes salt much bigger in terms of long-term sustainable value than gold,“ he added.
By: Rainbowradioonline.com/Ghana
