Minister of State for Solid Minerals Development, Hon. Abubakar Bawa Bwari says government is strategizing on how to formalize and regulate illegal mining activities in the country to create jobs and generate revenue.
He stated this at the weekend while speaking with a delegation of the African Development Bank (ADB) who was on a three-day official visit to Nigeria.
Hon. Bwari mentioned that government is targeting three areas in the improvement of the solid mineral sector such as the acquisition of bankable geological data to attract big players in the industry, formalizing illegal mining and the need to have certified mining laboratories that will be globally recognised.
He further said that illegal mining activities in the country is a source of job opportunities for a lot of Nigerians across the country and government intends to formalise these set of people, organise them into cooperatives in line with best global practices, register them and generate revenue from them for the government.
Also speaking on illegal mining in the country, the Director General, Mining Cadastral Office, Engineer Mohammed Amate said there are categories of illegal mining, the first category is those investors who obtain exploration license to explore a particular area and end up engaging in mining activities. The second category are the informal miners who find an open area and out of ignorance of the law begin to exploit minerals. According to him, these are the type of illegal miners the government intends to formalise, encourage them to form cooperatives, dedicate certain areas for them to mine, legalise their activities by giving them small scale mining license to exploit that area.
Earlier, the leader of the delegation and Director for Strategy and Operational Policy, African Development Bank (ADB), Mr. Kapic Kapoor said their mission to the Ministry of Solid Minerals Development is to discuss on how the ADB can help the government in improving the sector considering the focus of government on the diversification of the economy.
He said the Bank wants to know the Ministry’s areas of priority, investment, key policy bottlenecks and how ADB can support the sector.