Ghana’s battle against galamsey has reached a turning point, with the Ministry of Lands and Natural Resources signaling that Legislative Instrument (LI) 2462 could soon be repealed as part of sweeping measures to confront the nation’s illegal mining crisis.
Browsing: Environment
The acrid scent of burnt shea butter still clings to Ama Serwah’s hands six months after her life evaporated. “I stood right here watching flames swallow 20 years of work,” she says, kicking a twisted metal frame that once held her savings. “No water came. Only smoke and lies.” Her stall at Techiman Market’s Butubutu corner vanished on January 12, 2025—one of *seven infernos* that raged across Ghana in 30 days, devouring livelihoods while climate change turned neglect into catastrophe .
The Forestry Commission says the country aims to plant 30 million seedlings this year alone, up from the 25 million reported in 2024, with a national survival rate of just under 60%, according to the Ministry of Lands and Natural Resources.
Adwoa works hard on her 15-acre cocoa farm. With the help of these trees, she’s increased her cocoa harvest by 50%. But her carbon earnings for the whole year? Just $14.72. Meanwhile, big chocolate companies in Europe are making over $120 million by trading carbon credits from trees like hers.
Adwoa is one of 140,000 cocoa farmers in Ghana who joined the REDD+ program. It promised that farmers would get paid for protecting trees and reducing deforestation. But in her region, Western North, nearly 92% of farmers have no formal land documents. Because of this, their trees don’t count in the digital systems used to trade carbon. They are left out.
Her family is among 70,000 climate refugees who poured into Ghana’s Bono East region since 2023, escaping the Sahel’s advance. Now, they’re trapped in a cycle of exploitation and violence that exposes the human cost of global inaction
In 2023, Ghana exported over $10 million worth of scrap metal, according to the Ghana Export Promotion Authority.
For generations, Techiman’s farmers cleared fields with controlled burns. “Fire is our tractor,” explains cassava processor Kofi Boateng, gesturing at mounds of rotting mango peels outside Techiman Central Market. But climate change has weaponized tradition:
– *Rainfall has dropped 30% since 2020, desiccating crops into tinder
– Temperatures now spike to 42°C during Harmattan season
– 300+ tons of weekly market waste—with no municipal composting—pile up in fields
The Machine Sees What It’s Told to See
Cadbury’s Cocoa Life program says their AI can spot child labor with 85% accuracy, but only within the GPS locations given to them by cocoa cooperatives. That means if a child like Kofi walks out of the cocoa field and into a nearby mine, the system stops tracking him.
“Our satellites can identify children carrying machetes or cocoa sacks,” said a Nestlé sustainability officer, who asked not to be named. “But if that same child enters a mine pit after school? Our system marks that as ‘out of scope.’”
APEX, a civil society organization advocating for national development, has issued a stern call to Ghanaian authorities to intensify efforts in clamping down on illegal foreign miners, particularly Chinese nationals who have been implicated in destructive galamsey (illegal mining) operations across the country.
Every few months, the Ghanaian public is assured of a tough, no-nonsense crackdown on illegal gold mining, locally known as galamsey. Headlines scream victory as machines are seized and arrests are made. Yet, one inconvenient truth haunts these promises: galamsey thrives deeper, more lucrative, and more destructive than ever before — largely under the shadow of China’s influence and the deep, rotting roots of political compromise that began as far back as the Rawlings era.