The Chief Executive Officer of the Minerals Income and Investment Fund (MIIF), Edward Nana Yaw Koranteng, says the company has plans of amassing about $500 million worth of assets within the next three years.

He made this disclosure when he paid a courtesy call on the Western Regional Minister, Kwabena Okyere Darko-Mensah.

The courtesy call was part of his tour of the region, to interact with mining companies and other relevant stakeholders in the industry.

"MIIF’s intention really is to become the biggest minerals fund in Africa, and we are actually on the way to achieve that. We believe that in three years time, we should have about $500 million asset under management, but our impact will not be felt if it does not impact the people. It wouldn’t also be to any purpose if we do not see the main mining communities like Tarkwa being transformed.

“I’m therefore here in the region to also identify some of the needs of the communities and to look at why some of the mining companies have challenges in paying royalties. We want to also see what help we can give to the non-gold players in the sector like the quarries where we have challenges with royalties payment“, Mr. Koranteng remarked.

Touching on measures the MIIF intends to employ to achieve its desired target, he added that, "We intend to introduce what we call the Small Scale Mining Incubation Programme with the objective to see how we can help develop the small scale mining sector, turning it into mid-tier fully owned Ghanaian mining companies which will impact the entire mining value chain to create jobs and transform the community.

"We are looking at how we can start the pilot scheme with about four mines and invest equity capital of about GHS 60 million in the form of machinery. The conditions for them would be that they mine within the conditions set by the Minerals Commission. We wouldn’t expect them to pay back for these machines per se, but because it is an equity position, they will ramp up their production by 40%-100% and our returns will be the dividends that will come from their operations“, he stated.

On his part, the Western Regional Minister, Kwabena Okyere Darko-Mensah extended his well wishes to the company and tasked them to ensure that their operations benefits the local indigenes in the community. He also highlighted plans by his outfit to advance development in the Western Region.

“I have already had extensive interactions with the Finance Ministry and other people about making Sekondi-Takoradi the Financial Services hub of Ghana. This has gone into further discussions and I have been asked by the Finance Minister to nominate somebody to join the committee set up in Accra for the National Financial Services hub so we can look at how the two can be done because we have the resources and we think we can use that to leverage“, he said.