Small-scale miners have been urged to adopt mod­ern methods of mining instead of mercury to preserve the environment and promote the industry.

The Programmes Director for the Fund for Peace, a Non-Gov­ernmental Organisation (NGO) with the head office in Washing­ton, Wendy Wilson, who made the call in Accra on Monday during training for about 20 journalists on the Artisanal Small-scale Gold Mining (ASGM), said mercury was harmful to the environment and humans.

Mercury, she said, did not only impact on those who use it but the whole society, adding that it con­taminates water bodies and leads to kidney malfunction.

According to Ms Wilson, the use of the University of Mines and Technology (UMAT)’s Smart-Smelting Technology called Sikabukyia, an alternative to mer­cury, could help boost and sustain the ASGM sector.
    

The training formed part of the Responsive Engagement and Collective Bearing Approaches to Inform Mercury Substitution in Artisanal and Small-scale Gold Mining, Ghana (RECLAIMS ASGM Ghana) project which aims to reduce mercury use in the ASGM sector.

The six-year project, which started in 2018 and just ended and funded by the US Department of State, is implemented by The Fund for Peace in collaboration with UMAT and the West Africa Net­work for Peacebuilding Ghana.

Ms Wilson indicated that the RECLAIMS ASGM project im­plemented in the Western North and Upper East Region involved national-level activities, including policy work and local-level oper­ation activities where The Fund for Peace worked to increase the capacity of ASGM practitioners to adopt alternatives to mercury use.

She said at the local level about 100 ASGM practitioners were educated on the UMAT Direct Smelting Technology to extract gold.

“At the national level, we organ­ised dialogues for government, the donor community, and imple­menters to come together to have a common platform and space to discuss the variety and rich array of policies and projects being implemented in an effort to max­imise the impact of this project,” Ms Wilson stated.

She also said as part of the proj­ect, “We also have a regional pro­gramme to foster a community of practice around the harmonisation of reducing mercury use in the ASGM in the ECOWAS Member States as well as the supply of mercury in the zone.”

The Programmes Manager of The Fund for Peace, Christopher Nyarko, in a presentation, said effective reportage from journal­ists on ASGM could better inform citizens about happenings in the mining sector.