GGSA secures investor partnerships for geological investigations

The Ghana Geological Survey Authority (GGSA) will in November this year sign Memoranda of Understanding (MoUs) with investors, including the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region of China, to partner with the Authority on geological investigations.

The Director-General of the Authority, Dr Prosper Akaba, disclosed this to the media on Friday, September 11, 2026, in Tianjin, China, on the sidelines of the 28th China Mining Conference and Exhibition at the Meijiang Convention Centre.

He said the Governor of Guangxi had agreed to the partnership following engagements at the conference.

Dr Akaba described Ghana’s participation as highly successful, saying the Authority held up to five engagements a day with mining companies, government delegations and investors.

“We've held several meetings. In a single day, we could hold like five different engagements with mining companies, government delegations and investors and all that, and I can see something good coming to the country,” he said.

“Ghana Geological Survey Authority was able to get a few investors who were interested in partnering us, and we are willing to work with them. Later this year, we'll be signing MoUs with them, including Guangxi Autonomous Province,” he stated.

He said the Authority was now empowered by the government to undertake investigations in blocked-out areas, with work advancing in the Ashanti Region and Upper West Region, and moving to some places in the Upper East and Western Regions this month.

The work is funded by the GoldBod, MDF and Minerals Commission.

He said the investigations would help fight galamsey by delineating ore zones for targeted and supervised mining under the Responsible Cooperative Mining and Skills Development Programme (rCOMSDEP).

Dr Akaba advised persons engaged in illegal small-scale mining (galamsey) to exercise patience and take advantage of the government’s registration exercise.

“The advice I have for them is that they should exercise patience, and I think even the Honourable Minister, through the rCOMSDEP, is already going round the country and registering people under the co-operatives scheme, so I think they should take advantage of that as we continue with the efforts to map and investigate more areas,” he said.

“Then they should form cooperatives. Form the cooperatives and register. When that happens, they will be supervised to do the mining in a proper way,” he stated.

He also announced institutional reforms undertaken over the last nine months, including securing seven that took effect on August 26, 2026, after 10 years of operating without an LI since becoming an Authority in 2016.

He said the national earthquake monitoring system had been restored from two partially functional stations to all 21 stations now reporting real-time data, with weekly reports submitted to the government.

He commended the Minister for Lands and Natural Resources, Emmanuel Armah-Kofi Buah, for his passion, saying Ghana sought win-win partnerships.

“He made them know that we have the resources, they have the technology and the deep pockets and the funds. So we are not at their mercy, and we are willing to partner them, but it has to be a win-win cooperation. It shouldn’t be the case that they come and take extract our resources without us gaining substantial benefits from the operations,” he said.

“There is good news for the country and there is good news for the Ghana Geological Survey Authority,” he added.