As West Africa continues to attract substantial mining investments, the Ghana Chamber of Mines has initiated steps with government to implement “practical policies” aimed at positioning Ghana as a hub for the provision of services in the sector and the wider sub-regional mining market.

According to the Chamber, the move has become imperative in the sense that currently, Ghana has a window of opportunity to implement effective policies to ensure its position as an industry hub as emerging mining destinations in the sub-region – largely francophone countries – are bunching up to attract incoming investments to themselves.

An improved, competitive policy framework is expected to enable Ghana take advantage of the emerging mining industry investment destinations in the sub-region to encourage manufacturing, engineering and fabrication firms to set up manufacturing bases in Ghana to offer services to the mining industry.

Consequently, the Chamber has held a multi-stakeholder consultative workshop aimed at securing the needed support for local manufacturers in order to build their capacity to be more aggressive towards manufacturing of mining inputs in commercial quantity.

Briefing the Goldstreet Business during the local content workshop held in Accra, the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Chamber, Mr. Sulemanu Koney said his outfit was committed to deepen the local content agenda in the industry since local content remains a critical factor in harnessing the inherent value chain in the industry.

“We have a very small window to assert ourselves as the real hub. If we don’t implement practical and creative policies to position our country for such services, we might lose out. Naturally, the industry will frown on initiatives that potentially destroy value and ultimately make the industry uncompetitive”, he reiterated.

Addressing participants, Vice President of the Chamber who also doubles as the Executive Vice President; Head of Gold Fields – West Africa Region, Mr. Alfred Baku noted that the industry’s confidence in local content has been demonstrated even beyond its core business of mining and as such it beholds on the Chamber to work with stakeholders to create the environment to increase investment in the sector.

“The overriding rationale for these initiatives, however, is principally business-driven. That is, to develop a locally integrated business network that will lower the cost of production and create opportunities to spawn other businesses to support national development”, he said.

The Deputy Minister of Lands and Natural Resources Benito Owusu-Bio, who represented the sector Minister, Kwaku Asomah-Cheremeh noted that government was committed to provide incentives and support to complement its industrialization drive.

The purpose of the workshop was to harness opportunities within the mining industry’s local content agenda to enable local production and supply of mining inputs.