Accra has seen the opening of the Africa Centre for Minerals, Mining, and Sustainable Development (ACMMSD), a centre dedicated to promoting ethical and responsible mining, particularly small-scale mineral extraction in Ghana.
The Executive Secretary of the Centre, Edwin Letsa K. Kpedor, emphasised the significance of the Center in a press release to mark the launch, stressing the necessity of the Center in ensuring that extractive sector stakeholders comprehend and adopt sustainable means in the mining of minerals to ensure that our environment is protected, preserved, and reclaimed following successful small-scale mining activities.
The harmful impacts of unlawful and unsustainable mining operations on our water resources, forests, farms, and communities are currently being felt in our communities. Hence, the Center's primary goal is to assist parties involved in legislation, oversight, and small-scale mineral extraction to embrace new sustainable techniques to guarantee we buck the present trends in environmental degradation, water body contamination, and forest loss as seen across our mining towns.
He also remarked that the objective of the Centre will be to "organise the actual execution of legal and sustainable mining solutions and consolidate programmes that seek to promote sustainable livelihoods, particularly for women and young people in the mining communities across Ghana".
The Center is dedicated to using resources to promote regulation and supervision, advocacy, training, assistance, and stakeholder engagements throughout the different mining communities, particularly in the Ashanti, Eastern, Central, and West-North areas of Ghana, according to a separate press release.
"These places are the hotspots for unlawful (galamsey) and unsustainable mining operations, according to our first evaluation of the small-scale mining regime across the nation, and we intend to focus our actions in these regions," Mr. Kpedor stated.
The Center will directly train and build the capacity of key stakeholders, such as small-scale miners, traditional authorities, officers of district assemblies, and related service providers, to improve their knowledge of the use of legal and sustainable mining practises, according to Richard Nunekpeku, Director for Programmes and Projects. Richard Nunekpeku's comments on the Center's planned activities are summarised in the following paragraphs.
Moreover, the Centre will conduct research, publish findings, participate in advocacy, develop policies, and run programmes to help small-scale miners in its operating areas on a technical and financial level.
"Our strategy will be to offer thorough support services that will encourage stakeholders to completely commit to implementing sustainable practises that produce outcomes. We pledge to undertaking these as part of our engagement programmes and activities because we realise the need to make legal, regulatory, training, land management, mining, and support programmes for sustainable community development more accessible.
The Center's office is in Accra's Dzorwulu neighbourhood.
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