A Mining Engineer and Consultant, Ing Wisdom Edem Gomashie has emphasised the need for government to desist from politicising the Community Mining Scheme in the country.
This is contained in an eight point recommendation contained in a paper written by Ing Wisdom Edem Gomashie.
It comes after the Minister for Lands and Natural Resources, Emmanuel Armah Kofi Buah, criticized the Community Mining Scheme initiative of the NPP government as ineffective in combating illegal mining and contributing to the ongoing struggles with the menace.
Whilst calling for collaboration from the traditional leaders, he says his vision is to establish cooperatives and ensure that all miners operate within the law and adhere to environmentally sustainable practices.
But in a a paper titled ”Has the implementation of The Community Mining Scheme (CSM) by the Government Helped Mitigate Illegal Mining By Providing Alternative Livelihoods? (Using Akoon-Tarkwa Community Mining Scheme As A Case Study” Gomashie said the initiative must be supported by government to create more jobs.
”The government should strive, through stakeholder engagements, to ensure that the scheme is de-risked as being a “political establishment” but rather be seen as a reliable alternative livelihood for illegal miners. If done, it will ensure the sustainability of the scheme.”
”The government should take the beneficiaries of such schemes through various sustainability pieces of training, which seeks to guide them to invest their gains in non-mining ventures, by letting them know that the minerals are finite, the minerals market is not stable, such that they will not bounce back into illegal mining when unforeseen circumstances hit them or their CMS,” he said.
Below is the full paper:
Special Paper Wisdom Gomashie Ug (1) (1) by Fred Dzakpata on Scribd
