Ghana’s Lands and Natural Resources Minister, Emmanuel Armah-Kofi Buah, told a seminar at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology that the country’s sliding scale mining royalty regime generated GH¢7.82 billion in receipts between January and September 2026, about 106 percent more than the GH¢3.79 billion collected in the same period of 2025, and that the change had brought the state roughly GH¢4 billion more than the old flat rate would have. The Minerals and Mining Royalty Regulations of 2025, in force since March, replaced a flat 5 percent royalty with a variable rate of 5 to 12 percent that rises in stages with the gold price, starting above $1,900 an ounce, and falls when prices decline.
The minister used the same platform to outline the proposed new Mining Act, which has Cabinet approval and now goes to Parliament. Exploration would move to a single licence capped at five years with stringent conditions, ending the practice of holders sitting on concessions for 25 to 30 years without exploring: companies that fail to find commercially viable minerals in the period must relinquish the ground. Mining leases would be capped at 20 years, district mining committees would become the first point of contact for applications, a medium scale mining category would be created, and every lease holder would have to sign a community development agreement negotiated directly with the host community. The government has also signalled plans to phase out fiscal stability agreements, the deals that lock in tax and regulatory terms for a set period.
Exposure runs through the senior gold producers. Existing development agreements currently exclude Zijin, AngloGold Ashanti and Gold Fields from the new royalty rates, which is precisely why the stability phase out matters: it determines when, or whether, the sliding scale reaches the country’s largest mines. Industry responses so far have been measured; the Ghana Chamber of Mines has focused its public position on welcoming Parliament’s cut to the Growth and Sustainability Levy from 3 percent to 1 percent, while the Ghana Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative has argued the main investment concern is fiscal unpredictability rather than the royalty level itself.
Jurisdiction watch: Ghana’s model is becoming the West African template, higher state take indexed to price rather than fixed hikes, paired with use it or lose it licence terms. It is more investable than outright renegotiation because the rate falls with the price, but the stability agreement question decides whether producers can price Ghanaian risk for a full mine life.