The Ghana Chamber of Mines has charged the government to work at reducing the demand for gold produced by illegal miners as a measure of checking galamsey.
According to the chamber, the high demand for gold mined by galamsey operators is an incentive that drives investment in to the area.
Issues of galamsey has become topical due to its devastating effects on water bodies, forests, and cocoa farms.
Citi FM in an effort aimed at stopping illegal mining activities, campaigned with the hashtag “#StopGalamseyNow”.
Speaking on the campaign embarked upon by Citi FM , the Director of External Relations and Communications at the Chamber of Mines, Ahmed Natogma disclosed that gold that comes from illegal miners but get mixed up in the national output can easily be traced.
He stated that differentiating gold produced by illegal miners from the legal ones can help to block the sale of illegal gold, reducing their demand.
“There is a body responsible for buying the gold. There is the Precious Minerals Marketing Corporation that is involved in the gold buying so they need to up their game and they need to investigate further who they are buying it from and where the gold is coming from then we can take it from there” he said.
Mr. Natogma stressed that licensed gold miners can easily trace gold from legal sources since they normally deal with licensed agencies.
“As for the chamber we are a private sector organization. There are licensed agencies who are buying the gold, so we have to task them to do a little investigation as to the source of the gold,” he said.
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By: Lawrence Segbefia/citibusinessnews.com/Ghana