Women in mining: the challenges, opportunities and way forward -A conversation with Georgette Barnes Sakyi-Addo

Ghana is endowed with abundant mineral resources such as gold, bauxite, manganese, and lately, iron ore and lithium. Although the mining sector has been the major anchor for the local economy, there are concerns about the extent to which citizens have participated or benefitted from the mining value chain. There are even graver concerns about how the mining ecosystem accommodates women.

A fortnight ago, the Daily Graphic’s Timothy Ngnenbe (TN) attended a three-day workshop in the Goree Island in Senegal on prevention and management of conflicts related to resource extraction in West Africa. 

The workshop was organised by the Goree Institute, Centre for Democracy, Development and Culture in Africa (Goree Institute) from July 26 to 28, this year for selected journalists and civil society organisations (CSOs) for three mineral-rich Anglophone West African countries – Ghana, Nigeria and Sierra Leone.

Timothy Ngnenbe (TN), a journalist with the Daily Graphic, sat with one of the participants, Georgette Barnes Sakyi-Addo (GBS), to explore the challenges confronting women in Ghana’s mining value chain and the opportunities that could be explored to improve the situation.

Georgette Sakyi-Addo is the founder and Executive Director of Georgette Barnes Limited. She is also co-founder and president of Women in Mining Gh, former President of the Association of Women in Mining Africa (AWIMA) and co-founder of Accra Mining Network. The multilingual mining industry executive has received recognition by Forbes Afrique as one of Africa’s 100 most influential women in 2023.

Georgette Sakyi-Addo speaking at the Goree Institute in Senegal

Timothy Ngnenbe (TN): You have been in the mining industry for almost 30 years now. How did you venture into mining? How far have you travelled in this industry?

Georgette Barnes Sakyi-Addo (GBS): I started off in advertising and communications before joining a minerals exploration company around 1994, and I have never left the sector. I worked with four companies, including some in Francophone countries, and learnt on the job.  With one Australian consulting company, I worked for about 10 years and that actually set the stage for me. I founded my own company in 2009, Georgette Barnes Limited (GBL), a mine support service company. GBL represents international industry brands. We supply geological, exploration, drilling and mining consumables. We also offer exploration and maintenance services. In the core yard, we do the core storage systems, core markers, the rollers, racks and cutting machines. We also supply drilling fluids and drill muds for the drilling companies, and we have introduced the 3GSM drill and blast software to the industry.

TN: What kept you going in this male-dominated industry?

GBS: For me it is just an industry I work in, just like any other job. When I was working with the various mining companies earlier in my career, I made a conscious effort to learn on the job. I supported the technical team, got involved in all aspects of the business and that made me to fully understand the industry. What I do now with my own company is a combination of the experiences I gathered along the way, in addition to my own modest acumen as well as industry-specific short courses, including surface mining, mining engineering and mining law and policy. 

 TN: From all indications, you have found your feet in large-scale mining. 

GBS: GBL and I are well-known and established in the industry, but I still have a long way to go. My team and I are striving to achieve more in a complex industry.  It is tough; West Africa is not an easy region to work in. There are lots of structural and regulatory barriers, but we keep moving on.  

TN: What is your assessment of women’s participation in the mining industry, especially the large-scale sector?

GBS: Working in exploration, I noticed that there were not many women in the industry; I was often the lone female in meetings and conferences and I thought I could do something about it, and that is what led me to start WIM.  In the small-scale sector, however, I came across many women in my travels in Tarkwa, Obuasi and other mining areas. There are low barriers of entry into the artisanal mining labour force, so at that level you find a lot of women. But in the large-scale mining sector, only about 12 per cent are women, and this is even after many years of working at it.

TN: Why don’t we have many women in the large-scale mining supply value chain?

GBS: The mining industry is a highly specialised one; it relies on specific technical skills to deliver quality output which you must adhere to. As a result, establishing takes time because you have to build a pipeline of talent, and that begins from encouraging girls to take up Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) subjects and join their male counterparts into technical education, and so on. Currently, the University of Mines and Technology has an affirmative action enrolment programme for females.  An initiative like that is what is needed in other institutions to build that pipeline.

Georgette Sakyi-Addo speaking at the Goree Institute in Senegal

TN: For women that have found themselves in the mining industry, what challenges do they face?

GBS: A recent extensive research WIM-Gh undertook, with funding from Ford Foundation, brought up challenges women face in the mining industry, including workplace harassment and discriminatory practices.  A number of respondents said they were passed over for promotions. 

Retaining women in the sector is difficult because historically mines were designed for men; but now women are gradually getting recruited so it is a work in progress. A lot of the large-scale mines now have policies in place with specific targets for specialised departments to work on diversity and inclusion.

TN: What is WIM doing to improve the situation of women in the mining industry?

GBS: It was in an effort to address issues affecting women that a conversation started in 2013 with other women on the need to think together and address them. In 2015, we decided to formalise our meetings, so we registered Women in Mining, Ghana (WIM). The main purpose was to serve as an advocacy body for all women working in the mining sector (Industry, Academia and Government) by offering training, mentorship, networking and research.

Several global research reports have established that having women on boards, for instance, improves workplace culture, introduces innovation and diversity of thought, and eventually increases the bottom line. It’s in the interest of mining companies to create more space for women in every aspect of the industry.

TN: What are the low hanging fruits that women can take advantage of?

GBS: We need to encourage more professional women to take up employment opportunities in the mining industry.  Boardrooms and the C-Suites need to be diversified to reflect the real world, and the companies will be the better for it.  I must add that, thankfully, most of the large-scale mines now have diversity and inclusion policies, with targets they are striving to achieve in order to address the imbalance.  But, for emphasis, a long-term sustainable approach is one that ensures that a talent pipeline of females is created and nurtured for the industry. 

TN: This was an exhaustive conversation. I’m so grateful to you for your time. 

GBSA: Thank you Timothy for the opportunity.