How Ghana Is Fighting Galamsey: Enforcement, Forest Protection and Repairing the Damage

Ghana’s fight against illegal mining, commonly called galamsey, is increasingly moving beyond raids on mining sites. The country’s current strategy combines security operations, permanent protection of vulnerable forests and rivers, land reclamation, reforestation, regulation of the gold trade and efforts to move small-scale miners into legal operations.

One of the clearest examples is unfolding inside the Tano Nimri Forest Reserve, where illegal mining destroyed approximately 192.4 hectares of woodland between 2021 and 2024. The Ghana Gold Board is financing an approximately GH¢35 million restoration project, equivalent to roughly US$3.01 million, £2.27 million, or CN¥20.16 million at October 15, 2026 exchange rates, beginning with 50 hectares of severely damaged forest.

The project shows an important but sometimes overlooked part of the galamsey problem: removing illegal miners does not automatically repair the environment they leave behind. Abandoned sites can contain deep water-filled pits, unstable ground, damaged soil, deforested land and drainage systems that continue carrying sediment into rivers long after mining stops.

This guide explains how Ghana is fighting galamsey, how damaged land is being repaired, what NAIMOS and GoldBod are doing, how forest reserves are being protected and why enforcement alone cannot solve the problem.

How Is Ghana Fighting Galamsey?

Ghana’s current anti-galamsey strategy uses several approaches at the same time rather than treating illegal mining purely as a policing problem. The Ministry of Lands and Natural Resources has described its strategy as combining enforcement, public engagement and education, alternative livelihoods, technology and coordination between state institutions.

In practice, that means security forces may remove miners from illegal sites while other agencies regulate gold trading, track mining equipment, reclaim damaged land, restore forests and attempt to bring artisanal and small-scale miners into the formal economy.

What Is NAIMOS and What Does It Do?

The National Anti-Illegal Mining Operations Secretariat, or NAIMOS, is a specialized unit under the Ministry of Lands and Natural Resources that coordinates intelligence-led operations against illegal mining. It was created to bring security, environmental and mining agencies into a more coordinated enforcement structure rather than relying entirely on isolated raids by individual institutions.

NAIMOS operations target illegal mining sites, particularly around forest reserves, rivers and known mining corridors. According to the Ministry, the organization uses intelligence to locate active sites, deploy field teams, remove illegal operators and disrupt the equipment and infrastructure supporting unauthorized mining.

The Ministry said in March 2026 that nine permanent field task forces were being deployed in phases to important mining hotspots. The stated objective was to maintain a presence after an operation rather than repeatedly clearing a location only to have illegal miners return.

Protecting Forest Reserves and Rivers From Illegal Mining

Forest reserves and water bodies are among the most environmentally sensitive parts of Ghana’s anti-galamsey campaign. Illegal mining in these areas can remove vegetation, destroy habitats, alter waterways and send large quantities of sediment into rivers used by communities and water-treatment systems.

The Ministry of Lands and Natural Resources has designated forests and rivers as areas requiring heightened protection and has called for sustained security deployments in vulnerable locations. In October 2026, President John Mahama said nine forest reserves previously classified as heavily affected “red zones” had been cleared of active galamsey operators and that soldiers were being stationed there to reduce the likelihood of miners returning.

That continued presence is important because one of the recurring problems with anti-galamsey operations has been reoccupation. Authorities may clear a mining site, but if the economic incentive remains and there is no permanent monitoring, miners can return after security personnel leave.

How Is Galamsey-Damaged Land Reclaimed?

Stopping mining is only the first stage of environmental recovery. Heavily mined land often has to be physically reconstructed before trees or other vegetation can survive there again.

At badly damaged sites, reclamation can involve draining water-filled excavations, filling deep pits, mixing unstable mud with stronger soil, reshaping the landscape, compacting loose ground and creating drainage systems. Engineers may also have to stabilize slopes and control runoff so that rain does not immediately wash disturbed soil into nearby rivers.

Only after those engineering works are completed can ecological restoration begin effectively. That is why Ghana’s current reclamation projects involve both engineering institutions and environmental agencies.

What Is Happening at the Tano Nimri Forest Reserve?

The Tano Nimri Forest Reserve has become one of Ghana’s clearest examples of post-galamsey land reclamation. Project records cited by GoldBod and the Ghana News Agency indicate that approximately 192.4 hectares of woodland were destroyed between 2021 and 2024, while project planning documents use approximately 200 hectares as the broader affected area.

GoldBod is funding the restoration under its National Reclamation and Environmental Restoration Programme. The initial intervention covers 50 hectares in Compartment 161 near Samreboi, with the Ghana Armed Forces Engineer Regiment carrying out the heavy civil works and the Forestry Commission responsible for the reforestation and longer-term ecological restoration.

Military engineers identified 10 major mining pits along with numerous smaller excavations. Work has included draining the pits, drying and mixing muddy material with stronger soil, backfilling the holes, grading the land and constructing drainage channels intended to reduce erosion and the movement of sediment toward the Tano River.

How Much Is Ghana Spending on the Tano Nimri Restoration?

The current project is valued at approximately GH¢35 million, equivalent to roughly US$3.01 million, £2.27 million, or CN¥20.16 million using October 15, 2026 exchange rates. GoldBod is providing the financing and supervisory oversight, while the Ghana Armed Forces and Forestry Commission are providing specialized implementation roles.

The initial project is not intended to restore every hectare affected by illegal mining at Tano Nimri immediately. The first intervention covers 50 hectares, and GoldBod has said it plans to expand the programme, including another 100 hectares of degraded forest land in 2027.

What Happens After the Mining Pits Are Filled?

Once engineering work makes the site sufficiently stable, responsibility shifts toward ecological restoration. At Tano Nimri, the Forestry Commission is expected to supervise vegetation recovery, reforestation and the regeneration of appropriate indigenous species.

Reforestation is not simply about making the landscape look green again. A functioning forest helps stabilize soil, improve water retention, reduce runoff, provide habitat, store carbon and protect watersheds. Restoring a damaged reserve therefore requires monitoring over several years rather than a single tree-planting exercise.

The Tano Nimri project is expected to serve as a pilot for similar interventions in other mining-damaged landscapes if the approach proves workable.

How Does Ghana Stop Illegal Miners From Returning?

This is one of the hardest parts of reclamation. Repairing a site makes little sense if illegal mining restarts after the engineers and forestry teams leave.

Government’s current approach places greater emphasis on sustained security presence in heavily affected forest reserves and mining hotspots. NAIMOS has also said its 2026 field strategy favors permanent or longer-duration task-force deployment rather than occasional operations followed by complete withdrawal.

Whether that approach succeeds will depend on enforcement consistency, local cooperation, prosecution of offenders and whether the economic incentives that drive illegal mining are reduced.

Can Ghana Trace Gold Back to Where It Was Mined?

Another part of the strategy focuses on the gold itself. If illegally mined gold can easily enter the legal export market, enforcement at mine sites becomes much harder because illegal operators still have somewhere to sell their production.

GoldBod has therefore been developing a national technology-based traceability system intended to track gold from the point of production through the supply chain and ultimately to export. The Board began procurement for the system in 2026 after seeking proposals from technology providers.

The proposed system is intended to make it easier to determine which licensed mining operation produced a particular supply of gold. GoldBod has also introduced supplier identification, due-diligence requirements and records for agents and aggregators under its responsible-sourcing framework.

The system was still being developed and procured during 2026, so readers should distinguish the planned nationwide traceability capability from systems that are already fully operational.

How Is GoldBod Trying to Keep Illegal Gold Out of the Formal Market?

GoldBod says licensed aggregators and other counterparties must comply with responsible-sourcing and due-diligence requirements. Its policy includes supplier identification, beneficial-ownership checks, sanctions screening, transaction records and ongoing monitoring intended to help identify suspicious suppliers or gold of questionable origin.

The idea is to attack illegal mining from the demand side as well as the production side. If formal buyers require verifiable legal sources, illegally mined gold becomes harder to move through legitimate channels.

That does not eliminate smuggling or informal trading, which remain enforcement challenges. Traceability is therefore one part of a wider system rather than a replacement for policing mining areas.

Can Illegal Small-Scale Miners Be Moved Into Legal Mining?

Ghana’s strategy also recognizes that not every person involved in unauthorized small-scale mining can be dealt with solely through arrests. Artisanal and small-scale mining provides income to many communities, and simply closing sites without creating legal alternatives can push activity elsewhere.

GoldBod says it plans to begin an Artisanal and Small-Scale Mining Formalisation and Financing Support Programme in 2027 in collaboration with the Ministry of Lands and Natural Resources, Minerals Commission and other institutions. The planned programme is intended to help miners move toward legal operations through regulatory compliance, training, concession assessment, equipment financing and mining services.

The underlying idea is to separate legal small-scale mining from galamsey. Small-scale mining itself is not automatically illegal in Ghana. The problem arises when mining occurs without the required licence, outside approved concessions, inside prohibited areas or in violation of environmental and mining regulations.

Is Tano Nimri the Only Land Reclamation Project?

No. The Tano Nimri intervention is part of a broader effort to restore landscapes affected by mining and other forms of degradation. The Ministry of Lands and Natural Resources has also reported separate government reclamation work and operates the Ghana Landscape Restoration and Small-Scale Mining Project, which combines degraded-land restoration with forest management, mining-sector formalization and land-use planning.

The government has also used wider forestry programmes to restore degraded landscapes. However, general tree-planting programmes and reclamation of heavily mined land are not the same thing. A severely excavated galamsey site may require substantial engineering before normal forestry restoration can begin.

Why Is Galamsey So Difficult to Stop?

Illegal mining is difficult to eliminate because it is simultaneously an environmental, economic, law-enforcement and governance problem. High gold prices can make unauthorized mining extremely profitable, while communities in mining areas may depend on the activity for income even when the long-term environmental damage is severe.

Authorities also face practical problems such as miners returning after security teams leave, equipment being moved between sites, illegal gold entering informal trading networks, mining occurring in remote areas and the cost of repairing land after it has already been destroyed.

The damage can also continue after the mining itself stops. Unstable pits can remain dangerous, while exposed soil and waste can continue entering rivers during rainfall. This is why measuring the fight against galamsey only by arrests or equipment seizures provides an incomplete picture.

How Can We Tell Whether Ghana’s Anti-Galamsey Strategy Is Working?

A durable reduction in galamsey would need to show up in environmental and economic outcomes, not only the number of enforcement operations announced. Useful measures include whether illegal miners stay out of cleared forest reserves, whether previously polluted rivers improve, whether reclaimed land remains restored, whether illegally sourced gold becomes harder to sell and whether more small-scale miners move into licensed operations.

Other indicators include the number of hectares successfully reclaimed, survival of replanted forests, reductions in mining inside protected areas and the ability to trace gold entering Ghana’s formal export system back to legitimate sources.

Official agencies have reported progress in several areas, but many of the current programmes are still being expanded. Long-term environmental monitoring will therefore be necessary before the full effectiveness of the strategy can be judged.

Can the Public Report Suspected Illegal Mining?

Illegal mining investigations often depend on local information because residents may see mining activity, equipment movements or river pollution before national agencies do. NAIMOS is the Ministry of Lands and Natural Resources unit responsible for coordinating anti-illegal-mining operations and publishes official contact channels for information and enquiries.

People reporting suspected illegal mining should provide specific information where it is safe to do so, such as the community, approximate location, nearby river or forest reserve, type of activity observed and when the activity occurs. Members of the public should not personally confront suspected illegal miners or enter dangerous mining sites to obtain evidence.

What Happens Next?

The Tano Nimri project is expected to move from heavy engineering into Forestry Commission-led ecological restoration once the site has been stabilized. GoldBod has also announced plans to extend reclamation to another 100 hectares of devastated forest land in 2027.

At the national level, the next major tests include whether permanent security deployments can prevent reoccupation of protected areas, whether GoldBod’s traceability system becomes fully operational, whether small-scale mining formalization works at scale and whether reclaimed areas remain intact after restoration teams leave.

Bottom Line

Ghana’s current fight against galamsey is no longer limited to sending security forces to shut down illegal mining sites. The strategy now extends from the mine itself to forests, rivers, abandoned land and the gold trading system that ultimately buys and exports the mineral.

NAIMOS is responsible for coordinated enforcement operations, security forces are being used to protect sensitive areas, GoldBod is developing gold traceability and responsible-sourcing systems, and agencies are attempting to move legitimate small-scale miners into a regulated industry.

The GH¢35 million Tano Nimri project demonstrates the other side of that strategy: repairing what has already been destroyed. Military engineers are filling dangerous pits and rebuilding the terrain before the Forestry Commission begins long-term forest restoration.

The ultimate measure of success will not simply be how many illegal mining sites Ghana closes. It will be whether miners stay out of protected areas, whether damaged rivers and forests recover, whether legal miners have workable alternatives and whether illegally mined gold becomes increasingly difficult to sell through Ghana’s formal market.

Sources

• Ghana Gold Board: GH¢35 Million Land Reclamation at Tano Nimri Forest Reserve (October 14, 2026)
• Ghana News Agency: GoldBod Commits GH¢35 Million to Reclaim Galamsey-Damaged Forest Reserve (October 15, 2026)
• Ghana Gold Board: National Land Reclamation, Rehabilitation and Reforestation Programme
• Ministry of Lands and Natural Resources: National Anti-Illegal Mining Operations Secretariat
• Ministry of Lands and Natural Resources: NAIMOS 2026 Operational Strategy
• Ghana Gold Board: Procurement of National Gold Traceability System
• Ghana Gold Board: Responsible Sourcing and Supply Chain Sustainability Policy
• Ministry of Lands and Natural Resources: Ghana Landscape Restoration and Small-Scale Mining Project