Prestea in southwest Ghana has been an important gold mining area for more than 100 years. Local people have worked as small-scale miners and as employees of large companies. However, there is now conflict between miners, mining companies and the government over the rights to mine some of the land.

In 2001, a new company took over the mining concession and decided it was not economically viable to mine a large underground section of land. This left 3,000 local people unemployed. In 2005, there were violent clashes between miners and the army. Researchers from the University of Manchester in the UK interviewed representatives from all sides to find solutions to these tensions.

Local people feel they should have legal access to mining areas that the company does not use. They have no alternative way to make a living and there is no other employment in the area. They want to register as legal small-scale miners on unused portions of concession land. Although they mine unused areas, government officials still see them as dangerous criminals who need to be moved.

The company that owns the concession argues that it bought the rights to this land and that the illegal miners are thieves. The company feels the responsibility for negotiating lies with the government, not with it.

Many government officials think illegal miners should be removed by force. They are therefore unwilling to talk with them. However, a few members of central government have recognised that poverty and unemployment leave illegal miners with few choices.

Some solutions have been attempted:

• The government and the mining company have tried to relocate illegal miners. The government identified areas to move them to but did so without consultation. Furthermore, they did not examine the resources in new areas or consider the complex logistics of moving 10,000 people.
• Attempts to provide alternative sources of income were inappropriate. They did not match existing skills or consider the market for new products. For example, batik making was promoted, but there is no way to get products to a suitable market.

High unemployment and poverty means local people have little alternative but to continue mining areas illegally. The researchers suggest a number of ways to break through the current deadlock in negotiations:

• Local government officials must talk to miners’ representatives. They should then bring miners together with the company to discuss possible solutions.
• The government and the mining company must work with the community to identify realistic alternatives to small-scale mining. Another company in the area has helped people to develop fish and cocoa farms, which feed an existing market and can generate high incomes.
• The government should encourage banks to provide start-up funds and financial support for new small-scale ventures.
• Rather than attempting relocation, the government should pressurise the mining company to release unused portions of its concession, allowing miners to legally register there.

Source(s):
‘Strained Relations: a critical assessment of the mining conflict in Prestea, Ghana’ by Gavin M. Hilson and Natalia Yakovleva, in ‘Small-Scale Mining, Rural Subsistence and Poverty in West Africa’, Practical Action Publishing: Rugby, edited by Gavin M. Hilson, 2006

id21 Research Highlight: 28 June 2007

Further Information:
Gavin Hilson
Institute for Development Policy and Management
University of Manchester
Harold Hankins Building, Oxford Road
Manchester, M13 9QH
UK

Tel: +44 (0)161 2752811
Fax: +44 (0)161 2738829
Contact the contributor: gavin.hilson@manchester.ac.uk

Institute for Development Policy and Management, University of Manchester, UK

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