Mr. Abdulai Musah, Chairman of the Prestea Mining Group (PMG), made up of small-scale gold miners, has appealed to government to allocate to it mining concessions in the Western Region to create more jobs and eliminate illegal gold mining popularly known as “galamsey’. He said government in a bid to regularize illegal mining, demarcated lands for artisanal operators but registration of the areas had delayed and discouraged potential small-scale miners from the venture. Mr. Musah was speaking at a press conference, organized by the group in collaboration with Friends of the Nation, an environmental non-governmental organization (NGO), in Takoradi on Friday. He said the Minerals Commission has failed to conduct surveys to determine economic viability of the demarcated lands as directed by government, resulting in people encroaching concessions of larger mining companies to engage in “galamsey”. Mr. Musah said even though large-scale mining companies were unable to utilize all their concessions they did not allow small-scale miners to work there. He also said small-scale miners lack support and faced cumbersome registration procedures and disagreements with mining companies. Mr. Musah appealed to financial institutions to make loans and credit facilities available to small-scale miners.Source: GNA