The Ghana Gold Board (GoldBod) made about 98 per cent of its gold purchases from the artisanal and small-scale mining (ASM) sector from January 2025 to May 2026, the Deputy Minister of Finance, Thomas Nyarko Ampem, has told Parliament.
The GoldBod purchased 135.843 tonnes of gold in total across the period, with 135.221 tonnes of the total volume acquired from the ASM sector, and the rest from large-scale mining companies.
“Mr Speaker, last year, 2025, the GoldBod cumulatively purchased, aggregated and exported ASM gold totalling 104 tonnes, which generated in excess of $10 billion for the country,” he said.
Responding to a question on the floor of Parliament yesterday, Mr Ampem said, “This singular achievement of the GoldBod was critical in the appreciation of the Ghana cedi by about 41 per cent in 2025 and in increasing foreign reserves from about $8.98 billion in December 2024 to $13.8 billion by December 2025”.
He said this while answering a question by the Member of Parliament for Oforikrom, Michael Kwesi Addo, regarding the quantity of gold bought by the GoldBod, the source of supply, quantity bought from licensed small-scale miners and the amount being spent on purchasing gold.
Tangible benefits
The Deputy Finance Minister said from January 2025 to May 2026, the GoldBod expended approximately $16.1 billion on the purchase of gold, of which $9.8 billion was used between January and December, 2025.
He said the bigger policy point was that the government was deliberately shifting Ghana from a regime where gold wealth was dispersed, underpriced and smuggled.
“Through the GoldBod, we have a regime where gold is transparently aggregated, assayed, refined, exported and turned into foreign exchange and reserves for the Republic with visible and tangible benefits for the entire country.
To enhance regulatory compliance and sustainability, he said the GoldBod strengthened its collaboration with the National Anti-Illegal Mining Operations Secretariat (NAIMOS) to address illegal mining.
He emphasised that the GoldBod was not just about buying gold, but also about capturing Ghana’s gold for Ghana’s balance sheet, Ghana’s reserves, and Ghana’s economic sovereignty.
The minister pointed out that the GoldBod was a strategic arm of the nation’s macroeconomic recovery, anchored on foreign exchange mobilisation and anti-smuggling architecture.
The Ghana Gold Board Act, (Act 1140) 2025, he said, stipulated that its purpose was to bring our gold trade out of the shadows, formalise supply and ensure that Ghana captured the value that used to leak out through smuggling and fragmented trading channels.
“Mr Speaker, available reports (including from Reuters) indicate that Ghana lost about $11 4 billion between 2019 and 2023 through gold smuggling.
“The GoldBod is gradually reversing that bleeding,” he said.
Licensed aggregators
The deputy minister told the House that the GoldBod purchased and aggregated gold principally from the artisanal and small-scale mining sector through licensed buyers operating under the GoldBod licensing regime.
He said as of May 31, 2026, GoldBod had licensed a total of 1,184 buyers, comprising two aggregators, 67 self-financing aggregators, 736 tier 2 buyers and 379 tier 1 buyers.
Under the terms and conditions of their licences, he said those buyers were required to purchase gold exclusively from licensed miners for onward sale to the GoldBod.
Payment to MDF
Mr Ampem also answered a question by the MP for Juaben, Francis Kwabena Brempong Owusu-Akyaw, who wanted to know the last time the ministry paid mineral royalty to the Minerals Development Fund.
Responding, Mr Ampem confirmed that the most recent payment to the fund was GH¢100 million on June 3, 2026.
In addition to that, he said, the government transferred GH¢302.5 million between January and May 2026, bringing the total transferred to the fund to GH¢402.4 million for the year 2026.
Payment to LBCs
The MP for Kwabre East, Akwasi Gyamfi Onyina-Acheampong, sought to know the plans of the ministry to address COCOBOD’s payment to licensed buying companies (LBCs), especially from February to September.
The deputy minister said the government had adopted a set of reforms that would address the recurrent delay in payment to LBCs.
Those interventions, he said, included a new financing model that used domestic financing arrangements to finance cocoa purchases.
The new financing arrangement, he said, would be structured to ensure sufficient liquidity to LBCs throughout the year.
Mr Ampem added that a new COCOBOD Bill to be laid before the House would, among others, propose the prohibition of COCOBOD from quasi-fiscal expenditures.
“Those expenditures had derailed COCOBOD finances and affected its core functions such as cocoa purchases,” he said.
For instance, the minister said, in December 2024, while COCOBOD was paying for cocoa roads, LBCs were owed for cocoa delivered to COCOBOD, some of which dated back to 2022.
“Mr Speaker, we believe that the adoption of a new financing model, and the discipline imposed by the new COCOBOD Bill will address the yearly delays in payment to LBCs,” he said.
Mr Ampem added that between 2017 and 2023, COCOBOD typically used the syndicated loan to finance cocoa purchase and quasi-fiscal activities such as cocoa roads.
However, he said, when the syndicated loan was exhausted, the previous managers of COCOBOD resorted to additional borrowing from the domestic market through the issuance of expensive Cocoa Bills to finance the cocoa purchase.
“This careless appetite for borrowing led to unsustainable debt at COCOBOD, resulting in the default on the servicing of the cocoa bills in 2023,” he said.
