On its 98th Annual General Meeting

By Dr Steve Manteaw, Co-Chair, GHEITI Multi-Stakeholder Group

Accra, 5 June 2026

I stand on the established protocol to bring you warm greetings from the Ghana Extractive Industry Transparency Initiative, and I take this opportunity to express the governing body’s solidarity with the Chamber as you reflect on the contribution of mining to national development, looking at the past, the present and future prospects in a fast-changing mining ecosystem in Ghana and in the West Africa sub-region.

The relationship between the industry and the Ghana EITI has been evolving progressively over the last two decades, from mistrust, through accommodation, to collaboration in recent times. Through the instrumentation of the Chamber, companies report diligently to the Ghana EITI in fulfillment of the transparency and accountability mandate of the Initiative. Industry’s responsiveness to the findings and recommendations have also seen commendable progress.

Through the Chamber’s support, we are able to reach many more Ghanaians with our reports, which serve to address the information asymmetry that previously existed between civil society and community members on one hand, and the industry, on the other; and which contributed to the mistrust and the acrimony that characterised stakeholder relations.

Ladies and gentlemen, we are today, at a threshold that requires the re-examination of the progress we’ve made in contributing to the growth and well-being of our host country and communities, and to ask ourselves whether or not we can do more. It certainly cannot be a ‘business as usual’ approach. This is more so, because the rising gold prices has pushed to the fore, questions about whether or not the natural resource owner is receiving an equitable share of the benefits from the gold boom.

This has led to dramatic shifts in the mining ecosystem in the Sahel region, including our neighbouring Burkina Faso. Back in Ghana, we have also witnessed sweeping changes to the policy and regulatory environment, amidst a strong expression of resource nationalism by citizens and organised groups.

The times indeed call for introspection, and a carefully thought through strategy to court public understanding of the industry realities, explore new ways of value sharing, and adopt a more proactive engagement to address emerging concerns.

In all these, the delivery of knowledge products in collaboration with Ghanaian civil society and think tanks becomes an imperative. I’m glad the Chamber has accepted GHEITI’s proposal to assess the effective tax rates for major mining concessions in Ghana to establish the ‘Government Take’ Vrs. ‘Company Take’ to address the false but entrenched narrative that Ghana gets a mere 5% or less from its mining enterprise. This is in fact a major source of the nationalistic sentiments being expressed in the Ghanaian media and in public discourse spaces.

It is the hope of GHEITI that going forward we will deepen our collaboration, in furtherance of the transparency, accountability, and fiscal prudence principles, necessary to unleash the development potential of Ghana’s mineral resources.

Thank you.