The Inter-Ministerial Committee on Illegal Mining (IMCIM) has began registration for the Community Mining Programme, designed by the government as part of measures to curb illegal mining (galamsey).
The government is expected to later launch the programme which would enable residents in mining communities whose livelihood are solely depended on mining to work.
The registration of interested persons follows the reservation of mining concessions across mining regions by the IMCIM and the Minerals Commission for the programme.
This was contained in a statement issued by Prof. Kwabena Frimpong-Boateng, Minister of Environment, Science, Technology and Innovation and chairman of the IMCIM, in Accra yesterday.
It said qualified applicants were not only persons trained in the Sustainable Mining Course at the University of Mines and Technology (UMaT) in the Western Region.
Interested persons, the statement said, should register with their respective Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies (MMDAs) before Friday, June 21, 2019.
“The number of names submitted will determine the number of concessions that will be allotted to the Metropolitan, Municipal or District for the Community Mining Programme,” it said.
The programme is one of a number of reforms rolled out by the government as part of efforts to sanitise the mining sector after placing a ban on small scale mining activities and subsequently lifting it in December 2018.
BY TIMES REPORTER
