By Obrempong Yaw Ampofo
Ghana’s establishment of the Ghana Gold Board (Goldbod) signals bold ambition: formalize artisanal mining, sanitize gold trade, and plug billions lost to smuggling. On paper, it promises price stability, transparency and state control over an industry long dominated by shadow networks.
Goldbod will try, and Ghana must try. But the uncomfortable truth is that the fight against gold smuggling is unlikely to fully succeed in the near future. Not because the policy lacks merit.
But because gold smuggling is not merely an illegal act. It is an entrenched economic system rooted in necessity, trust networks, and incentives that formal bureaucracy has not yet replaced.
Gold Smuggling Isn’t Just Crime, It’s Social Infrastructure
For decades, informal buyers and sponsors have acted as:
- financiers,
- emergency bankers,
- pit investors,
- and community safety nets.
They stepped in where state institutions were absent. Breaking such a system is not achieved by regulation alone, it requires replacing livelihoods, not just policing them.
Gold Is Not Cocoa; It Can Disappear in a Shirt Pocket
Gold is shockingly easy to smuggle. Unlike cocoa:
| Cocoa | Gold |
| Bulk, visible | Tiny, microscopic at the miner level |
| Requires transport routes | Can be hidden in clothing or body |
| Easy to detect in bulk | Can be disguised as scrap metal or food |
| Hard to move unnoticed | A few grams in a pocket = thousands of cedis |
Fishermen can ferry gold offshore to neighbouring countries without passing a single checkpoint. Border scanners can miss it. And smugglers only need tiny quantities per trip to profit massively.
The fundamental question remains: How will Goldbod stop what it cannot see, measure, or trace?
Tarkwa’s Honest Voices Tell the Real Story
During my recent visit to Tarkwa, street-level gold buyers, once the lifeline of artisanal miners, expressed deep frustration.
Goldbod’s traceability rules require them to:
- ask miners where their gold came from
- record Ghana Card details
- verify amalgam origins
In their words:
“If I ask where the amalgam came from, the seller walks away and sells to someone who won’t ask. My shop is quiet now. The gold isn’t gone. It’s just gone to someone who won’t question it, as the miners want it. That gold will be smuggled.”
To them, traceability feels like self-incrimination:
“Take someone’s Ghana Card so they can later be traced and arrested? Who does that, and why would miners deal with us?”
By trying to ensure traceability at the point of sale, Goldbod has, inadvertently, created a market advantage for unregistered buyers who ask no questions.
The gold hasn’t stopped flowing. It has just changed direction, toward smuggling channels.
Remember 2017? The Ban Didn’t Break the System
History has already taught this lesson. In 2017, when Ghana banned small-scale mining, one would expect production to collapse. Instead, small-scale gold output only fell about 6%, from 4.1 million ounces in 2016 to 1,393,395 oz, still accounting for about 33% of national output. And that didn’t include what was smuggled. Banning formal pathways simply strengthened informal ones. When the legal route becomes harder, miners don’t stop, they move underground.
The Real Challenge
Gold smuggling is reinforced by:
- better prices from foreign buyers
- informal financiers who pre-fund mining
- corrupt border networks
- no-questions-asked buyers
- poverty and survival economics
You cannot criminalize hunger. You cannot police trust into existence. You cannot beat a shadow market unless the formal market works better for the miner.
What Goldbod Must Do to Stand a Chance
Goldbod’s existence matters and reform is essential. But success depends on:
- Better prices & fast payments, something already a problem
- State-backed financing so miners aren’t indebted to illegal sponsors
- Traceability with dignity, not intimidation
- Maritime and river surveillance, not just land borders
- Political insulation from capture
- Community partnerships and social benefits
People follow incentives, not instructions.
Goldbod will try, and Ghana must support the effort.
But let us be honest: the gold shadow economy still provides faster money, fewer questions, and community-level security the state currently does not.
Until the formal system becomes safer, easier, and more profitable than the informal one, gold will continue leaking into the shadows. The state may chase it, but the miner will follow whoever puts food on the table today.