Mining firms
are becoming more responsive to elaborate requirements on them to increase
their use of Ghanaian personnel as well as goods and services available locally,
the Minerals Commission has said.
The Commission
has already approved the localisation plans for five mines involving three
companies -- Newmont, Golden Star Resources and Goldfields -- which commit the
companies to increasing the use of Ghanaian personnel over time.
“As we speak
now, we are reviewing the localisation plans of Anglogold and Perseus Mining.
We have also written to three companies -- Chirano Gold, Ghana Manganese Company
Limited and Adamus Resources -- to submit their localisation plans to us for
review,” Collins Anim Sackey, Assistant Manager for Monitoring and Evaluation
at the Minerals Commission, told the B&FT.
Several
other operating mines are expected to submit their plans -- detailing the
number of expatriate staff they have, their qualifications, salaries as well as
Ghanaians identified to understudy the expatriates and the training they
require to take over in due course.
Ben Aryee,
CEO of the Commission, said: “If you look at the mining sector, there are
generally two areas that are looked at in terms of benefits. The first one is
the fiscal benefits -- the taxes, royalties, fees etc. But for us that is just
the small end of mining. Beyond that, mining has the capacity to catalyse other
economic activities, which for us is a big deal.”
Ghana, he
said, could in the long-run become a service industry for the mining industries
of neighbouring countries if the local content agenda is pursued to the letter.
“Mining, no
matter how efficient you are at it, will come to an end. The mineral will
finish at some point in time as you extract it. So our goal in pushing this
agenda also is to ensure that even when we stop mining we will have developed
industries that will continue,” he said.
The miners are themselves proud that beyond
tax and royalty payments, they are contributing to building local capacity and
ensuring sustainability.
Gold Fields
Limited says about 97 percent of its staff is already Ghanaian, and the Country
Manager Pierre Coussey sees his own appointment as part of the localisation
process.
“What we
have is that there are Ghanaians who are running departments starting from
Country Manager. In every structure and every department there is a Ghanaian
understudying; some are even held by Ghanaians as Head of Department (HoD) and
are understudied by other Ghanaians. This goes right across the board from the
engineering department to the analysis department and even finance,” he said.
“It is up to
us Ghanaians in Gold Fields to recognise that we must use our abilities to reach
where we have to go. If we decide that we are going to be victims of our own
disorganisation, it is up to us,” he added.
The Minerals
and Mining General Regulation 2012, LI 2173, which came into force on June 15,
2012, enjoins mining firms to submit localisation plans to the Commission
detailing how they intend increasing the employment of Ghanaian personnel.
For holders
of a mining lease, the regulation says that at commencement of operations or
upon coming into force of the regulation, the total number of expatriates in the
company should not exceed 10 percent of the total number of senior staff; and
three years after, the number has to be reduced to 6 percent. This means
certain expatriate positions will have to be eventually occupied by Ghanaians.
The plan has
to contain information on all the expatriates the company has or intends to
engage: the position, the job-description, what would be the minimum
requirement for that position, and what would be the minimum qualification.
The company
will also provide details of Ghanaian counterparts that have been indentified
to understudy the expatriate and provide same details on the Ghanaian,
including the targetted date for localisation of the particular position.
“We have set
up a tripartite committee that involves the Minerals Commission, the
Immigration Service and company involved, which will review the localisation
plan when we get the document,” said Anim Sackey.
“Additionally,
the company is supposed to provide the individual development plan for the
Ghanaian counterpart because the purpose of the exercise is not to put a
Ghanaian in a position for the company to say a Ghanaian cannot perform. So
give us the individual development plan, the training you are going to give to
him so that by the time he takes over from the expatriate he will be in full
readiness -- and this we will monitor,” he added.
After the plan has been approved, the
tripartite committee visits the mine in question to engage the Ghanaian senior
staff and let them know that the success of the localisation plan depends on
them.
“They should
know that if they fail, it is going to create an impression that the
localisation thing cannot work. So we go there and talk to the people on their
attitude toward work.”
In the case
of prospecting companies, at commencement the total number of expatriates
should not exceed 15 percent of the senior staff; 10 percent should be in the
skilled labour category and 5 percent in the technical and supervisory level.
However, after two years, this number is supposed to be reduced to 5 percent.
“What this
means is that after two years there should not be any expatriate in the skilled
labour category. Four years after, there should not be any expatriate in the
company. The reason is that after a certain time the company will transform
into a holder of a mining lease and the regulation there will then apply,” Anim
Sackey said.
A schedule
in the regulation allows Support Service Companies a certain number of
expatriate staff, depending on the activity they are involved in.
In terms of
goods and services, the companies are required to submit a five-year procurement
plan to the Commission. In preparing the plan, the companies need to take into
consideration a local procurement list that the Commission, from time to time,
makes available. On the list are items which are deemed available locally in
the right quality and quantity.
Companies
that go ahead to import goods available locally pay full duty, and in some
cases penalties apply as well.
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