Illicit Chinese Small-Scale Mining in Ghana: Beyond Institutional Weakness?

Abstract

While the engagement of Chinese migrants in small-scale mining in Ghana has gained traction in scholarship, the extant literature pays little attention to how the relationship between the so-called formal institutions (e.g., the Minerals Commission and Ministry of Land and Natural Resources) and informal institutions (e.g., the chieftaincy and customary land institutions) enables illegalities in the mining industry. This paper addresses this gap in the literature, focusing on the relationship between formal state and informal customary land institutions in the small-scale mining sector. Using an institutional analytical framework, we argue that the increasing involvement of the Chinese in small-scale mining in Ghana is an expression of a bigger and deep-seated problem characterized largely by uncoordinated interactions between key state and customary institutions. This, we suggest, creates parallel operations of formal and informal systems that promote different levels of agency and maneuvering among actors-breeding uncertainty, bureaucratic logjams, and illegalities in the mining industry. Based on our findings, we recommend that a more efficient coordination between the relevant state and traditional land governing institutions could curb the proliferation of illegal mining activities, and in particular, those involving Chinese migrants. As part of the conclusion, we suggest that future empirical research be conducted to explore the interactions between formal and informal institutions and how they affect mining activities.

Fried eggs and all-women gangs: the geopolitics of Chinese gold mining in Ghana, bodily vulnerability, and resistance

“…Chinese-approximately 500 million individuals-use gold for investment in real estate, security, and capital markets (Boafo et al, 2019;Moyo, 2012). These processes, along with demand for jewelry and industrial purposes, triggered intense demand for the commodity.…”

An Integrated Approach to Assess the Environmental Impacts of Large-Scale Gold Mining: The Nzema-Gold Mines in the Ellembelle District of Ghana as a Case Study

“…Most mining activities possess detrimental effects on the host environment, due to their continued use of modern, sophisticated machinery, harmful chemicals, and extended blasting levels. Unsupervised and unsafe activities by large-scale and artisanal small-scale mines are characterized by overwhelming environmental degradation, including water, air, and noise pollution, deforestation, destruction and loss of vegetation and ecosystem, land degradation, loss of soil fertility, and massive erosion [ 8 , 9 , 10 ]. Agricultural lands are not only generally degraded, but very scarce.…”

“…In Ghana, small-scale artisanal firms stood for frequent accusations as guilty of these environmental challenges, due to their unsafe modes of operations. This, therefore, led to the imposition of a ban on small-scale mining activities in Ghana by the government in 2017 [ 9 , 12 , 13 ]. Research works in this study domain primarily focused on small-scale mining activities and their impacts on the environment, mitigation measures, and regulations to sustain the small-scale mining sector.…”

“…For example, Bansah et al (2016), in their work, suggested that small-scale mining firms should utilize professional engineers in their operation to help control the related negative environmental and social impacts [ 1 , 12 ]. Boafo et al (2019) also postulated that environmental consequences caused by gold mining in Ghana are mainly a result of small-scale mining firms and weak institutional supervision [ 9 ]. Besides, the environmental and social impacts of gold mining in Ghana within the last decade are very challenging, with less focus and minimal research on the large-scale gold mining sector.…”

Occupying the Fringes: The Struggles of Women in Artisanal and Small-Scale Gold Mining in Rural Ghana—Evidence from the Prestea–Huni Valley Municipality

“…However, it is pertinent to note that the ASM sector has seen a relatively higher level of sophistication in some developing countries. In Ghana, for instance, since the influx of Chinese gold miners from the early 2000s, the ASM industry has been transformed by imported sophisticated machines [5], popularly known as Chang fa. Since the 1980s and 1990s, structural adjustment programs in many mineral-rich developing economies had profound effects on ASM participation and its regulations due to the push from trade and farming activities by many impoverished people to the ASM industry [47].…”