A dump truck is seen at a mining pit as commercial gold production begins at the Newmont Ghana Gold Limited, Ahafo North Mine, in Afrisipakrom community in the Ahafo Region, Ghana. October 29, 2025. Image@ REUTERS/Francis Kokoroko/File Photo
Ghana has quietly been converting its gold wealth into monetary muscle, and now it is turning the dial up further. The state gold trader GoldBod announced on Thursday that it has sealed an agreement with large-scale mining companies to buy 30% of their annual output beginning July 1, raising the bar from a 20% commitment that, by the government’s own admission, was barely being honoured.
Industrial miners delivered roughly 10 tonnes of gold to the central bank in 2025 against declared production of about 100 tonnes, an effective compliance rate of 10%, against the existing 20% commitment. By doubling down on the headline figure and centralising all shipments through GoldBod as the mandatory export gatekeeper, Accra aims to tighten enforcement while dramatically scaling up volumes flowing into national reserves.
Under the new arrangement, each large-scale mining company will sell 30% of its gold output to GoldBod in doré-raw, unrefined-form, at a discount of 0.55% of the Bank of Ghana reference exchange rate, with all purchases settled in Ghanaian cedis.
The deal marks a significant upgrade on the programme Ghana first launched in 2022 at the height of its economic crisis, when it struck a 20% supply agreement with miners through the Ghana Chamber of Mines to shore up a collapsing cedi and meet IMF bailout conditions. Ghana’s central bank has since scaled up its gold holdings from 8.7 metric tons in 2022 to 30.8 tons by February this year. Those gains helped the cedi appreciate by approximately 41% in 2025 and lifted foreign reserves from about $8.98 billion in December 2024 to $13.8 billion by December 2025.
The revised arrangement feeds into the Ghana Accelerated National Reserve Accumulation Programme (GANRAP), which targets foreign reserves equivalent to 15 months of import cover by the end of 2028. Intermediate milestones include 8.6 months of import cover by end of 2026 and 11.8 months by end of 2027, with an overall target of up to 157 tonnes of gold by 2028.
Beyond reserve-building, the deal is designed to transform how Ghana handles its gold before it leaves the country. All doré gold purchased by GoldBod will be refined locally before being sent to a London Bullion Market Association-certified refinery for melting, stamping and eventual delivery to the Bank of Ghana. “The new arrangement has been strategically curated by government to ensure that Ghana achieves LBMA accreditation for at least one local gold refinery by the year 2030,” GoldBod said. The move aligns with President John Mahama’s stated ambition of achieving zero raw mineral exports by 2030.
GoldBod already holds exclusive purchasing rights over Ghana’s artisanal and small-scale mining sector. From January 2025 to May 2026, the board purchased a cumulative 135.843 tonnes of gold, generating more than $10 billion in foreign exchange, with about 98% of those volumes sourced from artisanal miners. Pulling large-scale producers more firmly into the net is the next frontier.
Gold now accounts for around 57% of Ghana’s total export revenue, with the country earning $11.6 billion from gold exports in 2024 alone, a 52.6% jump from the previous year, driven by a 30% rise in gold prices. Central banks worldwide have been piling into bullion as elevated prices reinforce its appeal as a reserve buffer against external shocks.
Not everyone is ready to sign on without conditions, however. Ghana Chamber of Mines CEO Kenneth Ashigbey said negotiations remain ongoing, with industry players seeking phased implementation rather than an immediate jump to 30%, while also raising concerns about the discount terms, freight and purity costs, and the absence of compensation for currency risk.
By: Andrews Kwesi Yeboah