Akropong (E/R), Feb. 16, GNA - Newmont Gold Ghana Limited has registered over 424 household members onto the National Health Insurance Scheme to make good its policy of medically empowering households impacted by its mining activities.

The company has also assisted over 478 farmers with land and agricultural inputs as a way of providing them with alternative livelihoods following its mining activities in the communities. This was contained on the Fact Sheet of Interventions by the company under its Vulnerable Programme to support identified households impacted by its activities to attain self sufficiency through provision of accommodation, means of income, access to medical care and food copied to the Ghana News Agency on Monday.

It said the programme, which was being implemented in partnership with Guards of the Earth, and the Vulnerable, a local Non-Governmental Organisation and the Opportunities Industrialization Centre International had led to a significant improvement in the living conditions of the people in its resettlement towns including Ntotroso in the Brong Ahafo Region.

It said the programme had provided scholarships to some students in second cycle and vocational training institutions and for others who could not make it to higher institutions of learning to help them acquire employable skills. According to the document, the programme was still ongoing and was hopeful that more people would benefit to ensure that hostilities, which characterised mining companies and their catchment communities, often attributed to unfair practices became a thing of the past. 16 Feb. 09