The dangerous gap between knowing where minerals are and knowing what to do with them
By Ing. Prof. Douglas Boateng
Chartered Director IoD UK | Chartered Engineer UK
Fellow Institute of Directors UK | Fellow Ghana Institution of Engineering
Governance, industrialisation, and supply chain strategist
What is wrong with us: we know extraction, not the business
Africa knows mining. We have known it for centuries. We know how to dig. We know how to follow a vein. We know how to wash soil until gold glitters. We know how to point at a hill and say, “We are sitting on money, but hungry.”
But here is the uncomfortable truth we keep avoiding: We think we know mining, but most decision-makers and policymakers in mining generally do not understand the business of mining.
We understand extraction.
We understand survival digging.
We understand artisanal hustle.
We understand royalty slogans and production announcements.
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What we do not understand, or refuse to fully confront, is mining as an economic system with long tails, delayed costs, generational consequences, and unforgiving arithmetic.
This is not an accusation. It is a diagnosis. And like most diagnoses, it hurts because it is accurate.
NyansaKasa (words of wisdom) whispers:
“A man who celebrates the sound of digging but ignores the echo will soon hear hunger answering back.”
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What is wrong with us: we celebrate holes, not balance sheets
Across Africa, conversations about mining are worryingly shallow. We talk about tonnes, ounces, barrels, and carats. We cheer discoveries. We clap at production milestones. Then the room goes silent when anyone asks about cost curves, capital recovery periods, commodity price cycles, hedging strategies, environmental liabilities, or mine closure costs.
Mining is not wealth by default. Mining is risk before reward.
A mine can operate for years without creating real national value if contracts are poorly structured, costs are underestimated, or prices turn against expectations. Yet African debates often sound like this: “The mineral is there, so money must come.”
NyansaKasa (words of wisdom) chuckles darkly:
“A man who counts chickens at the sight of eggs will soon negotiate with hunger.”
What is wrong with us: presence is not prosperity
Many African countries sit on mineral endowments that should make them prosperous. Yet some of the most mineral-rich nations struggle with debt, unemployment, and environmental damage. Meanwhile, countries with far fewer natural resources often outperform mineral-rich ones economically.
The difference is not luck. It is understanding.
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Mining is an input, not a business model. The business of mining includes financing structures, fiscal regimes, infrastructure integration, skills development, downstream processing, and exit and rehabilitation planning.
When these are absent, minerals become a curse with excellent public relations.
NyansaKasa (words of wisdom) sighs:
“Gold without wisdom is just heavy soil.”
What is wrong with us: the royalty illusion
Royalties are politically attractive. They sound simple. They feel patriotic. They give the impression of guaranteed income.
But royalties are blunt instruments.
They are paid whether a company is profitable or not. When commodity prices fall, high royalties accelerate mine closures. When prices rise, poorly designed royalties capture little upside.
Several African countries have lived this cycle repeatedly: royalty increases during booms, closures during downturns, layoffs, community suffering, and governments acting surprised.
What is wrong with us is not that we demand value.
It is that we demand numbers without understanding resilience.
NyansaKasa (words of wisdom) observes quietly:
“A cow milked without feeding will still die on schedule.”
What is wrong with us: the costs we pretend do not exist
Mining looks profitable until we count what we deliberately exclude.
Polluted rivers that destroy fisheries.
Farmland rendered useless for generations.
Health costs from heavy metals and dust.
Abandoned pits that become death traps.
Communities displaced without economic alternatives.
These are not side effects. They are unpriced costs.
In many African mining regions, agriculture collapses after mining begins. Food insecurity rises. When the mine closes, poverty deepens. Governments complain about illegal mining without admitting that legal mining laid the groundwork for desperation.
NyansaKasa (words of wisdom) laughs painfully:
“When gold leaves quietly, poverty stays behind to keep the house.”
What is wrong with us: artisanal mining, romance and ruin
We romanticise artisanal mining as empowerment. In reality, unmanaged artisanal mining often becomes environmental vandalism disguised as poverty alleviation.
Children drop out of school for quick cash.
Rivers are poisoned with mercury.
Forests disappear.
Informal economies grow violent.
When enforcement finally arrives, livelihoods collapse overnight. Yet we act surprised every time.
NyansaKasa (words of wisdom) shakes its head:
“A child who sells his books to buy a shovel digs ignorance deeper.”
What is wrong with us: we stop thinking at the mine gate
Perhaps the most damning indictment is this: Africa’s mining imagination ends at the mine gate.
Where are the refineries?
Where are the smelters?
Where are the battery plants?
Where are the jewellery clusters?
Where are the industrial ecosystems?
Countries that understand mining do not export rocks. They export industries.
Those that do not export minerals and import finished goods, then complain about trade deficits.
NyansaKasa (words of wisdom) bursts into a bitter laugh:
“We sell firewood and buy matches, then argue about inflation.”
What is wrong with us: lessons from elsewhere we ignore
Norway did not confuse oil with wealth. It treated oil as temporary and built a sovereign wealth fund to protect future generations.
Chile used copper to build institutions, fiscal discipline, and long-term planning.
Australia developed mining alongside skills, regulation, environmental enforcement, and local supplier industries.
China understood early that mining alone does not build power. It invested heavily in processing, logistics, and downstream industries.
Africa often negotiates mining agreements like emergency loans: quick signatures, short thinking, long regret.
NyansaKasa (words of wisdom) mutters:
“Those who rush to eat raw food spend longer in pain.”
What is wrong with us: governance is the multiplier
Mining magnifies governance quality.
Where institutions are strong, mining can be transformative.
Where institutions are weak, mining accelerates decay.
Mining revenues without accountability fuel corruption, patronage, and social division. Communities fight. Regions feel cheated. National unity erodes.
Instead of fixing governance, we blame mining.
NyansaKasa (words of wisdom) reminds us calmly:
“The mirror does not break the face. It only shows it.”
What is wrong with us: the generational crime we normalise
Mining is finite. Minerals do not regenerate.
Every tonne extracted today is unavailable tomorrow. When mining revenues are spent on salaries, subsidies, and short-term politics, future generations are quietly robbed.
Mining should build endowments, infrastructure, skills, and productive assets that outlive the mine.
NyansaKasa (words of wisdom) warns sternly:
“A father who sells the farm to throw a party feeds guests, not children.”
What is wrong with us: what must change
Mining literacy must become non-negotiable.
Contracts must prioritise value chains, not just royalties.
Environmental and social costs must be priced honestly.
Mining revenues must be invested, not consumed.
Life after mining must be planned before extraction begins.
NyansaKasa (words of wisdom) sums it up simply:
“A road is useful only if it leads somewhere.”
What is wrong with us: what history will not forgive
What is wrong with us is not ignorance of where the minerals are.
What is wrong with us is our stubborn refusal to learn what minerals actually do to nations.
We behave as though discovery equals development.
As though extraction equals prosperity.
As though digging deeper automatically means thinking further.
Africa’s tragedy is not that it mines. It is that it mines without memory, without mathematics, and without moral imagination.
NyansaKasa (words of wisdom) confronts us bluntly:
“A man who keeps falling into the same pit should stop blaming the darkness and ask why he keeps walking the same path.”
History will not be impressed by how much Africa extracted. It will ask harder questions:
Did mining leave Africa stronger or weaker?
Did it build institutions or destroy them?
Did it create industries or deepen dependency?
Did it secure futures or mortgage them?
Until Africa understands mining as a temporary opportunity rather than a permanent identity, the continent will keep mistaking movement for progress.
NyansaKasa (words of wisdom) delivers the final warning:
“The ground does not betray a nation. A nation betrays itself when it refuses to think.”
That is what is wrong with us.
And that is what must change.
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