EITI in Ghana

Ghana announced its intention to pilot EITI in the mining sector in June 2003 and achieved compliant status on 19 October 2010.

=Process= Ghana's Minerals Commission released the first revenue figures for the mining sector in September 2003, after which a ministerial decree established a multi-stakeholder National Steering Committee in February 2005 to oversee the implementation of the EITI, along with a Secretariat in the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning. Ghana was accepted as an EITI Candidate country on 27 September 2007.

An assessment on how to extend the EITI to the oil and gas sectors was undertaken in July 2009, and a new steering committee representing stakeholders from oil, gas and mining was inaugurated in September 2010 by the Minister of Finance and Economic Planning.

=Reports=

First aggregate report (2007)
In February 2007, the Ghana EITI process produced its first aggregated report, covering actual mining benefit payments made in the period January 2004 to June 2004. The mining benefits considered included mineral right licences, prospecting and mining, mineral royalties, ground rent, property rate, corporate tax, and dividend. The report selected six major companies for examination in the report: AngloGold Ashanti, GS (Bogosu/Gold) Ltd, Gold Fields Ltd, Abosso Goldfields Ltd, Ghana Manganese Ltd, and the Ghana Bauxite Company.

Some salient conclusions of the report were that, in general, payments made by mining companies to statutory bodies or agencies were well accounted for by the receiving agencies, with mineral royalty being the highest and most significant contribution. The report also noted, however, that there was no payment of ground rent and mineral right licence within the period by any of the selected companies, and that transparency in the disbursements of mineral royalties to the mining communities needed to be enhanced.

Second aggregate report (2007)
The second report, covering payments and receipts for the second half of 2004, was produced in August 2007.

Third aggregate report (2008)
A third report covering payments and receipts for 2005 was released in August 2008.

Reports on government revenues and disbursements
In September 2010, Ghana published three reports covering extensive data on government revenues and disbursements at both a central and local level for the years 2006, 2007 and 2008, and in September 2011 published the report covering the year 2009. Dissemination activities for the 2009 report are scheduled for February-March 2012, according to the EITI website.

Final validation report (2010)
Ghana submitted its final Validation report to the EITI Board on 1 June 2010, and was designated as EITI compliant the following October.

=External Links=

Official Website: GHEITI

Reports: Ghana 2009 EITI Reconcilition Report; Ghana 2008 EITI Reconciliation Report

=References=