Fri 17 July 2020:
250,000 people to be employed as Nigeria set to make $500M in annual revenue through gold mining
President Muhammadu Buhari said Thursday that the government is set to reform gold mining that will produce a revenue of $500 million annually.
Buhari said 250,000 people would be employed with new steps to be taken in the gold mining sector.
New regulations would boost the sector and a legal status would be granted for those mining gold, he said.
Buhari said reform movements would boost revenues and the central bank would buy gold from small-scale miners at a reasonable price.
Nigerian authorities have said illegal mining, prominent in the northwest, has fuelled widespread violence they attribute to “bandits”. Thousands of people have been killed in the region in recent years and swathes of the region are inaccessible. The military is deployed to tackle the insecurity but the conflict shows little sign of ending.
The extra revenues from gold could be a lifeline as the coronavirus pandemic and resulting global oil price crash cut off much of the state’s income.
The presence of armed groups in northwestern Nigeria lead to a security vacuum and an increase in illegal gold mining, which, according to the president, caused a loss of $3 billion from 2012 to 2018.
Nigeria has largely untapped deposits of 44 minerals including gold, iron ore, coal, tin and zinc, in more than 500 locations, but mining makes up just 0.3% of the economy
