Ada Songor Salt: Electrochem Ghana granted mining permit— Minerals Commission
Electrochem Ghana Limited, a salt and chlorine-akali manufacturing company, has fulfilled all regulatory requirements and granted the permit to mine salt at Songor in Ada, Mr Martin Kwaku Ayisi, the Chief Executive Officer of the Minerals Commission, has said.
He said the application for permission to acquire a concession to mine salt also went to Parliament for ratification and was subsequently gazetted.
Mr Ayisi, briefing journalists in Accra on Friday, on issues of regulation of the Ada Songor Salt Project, said the landowners had been given the necessary documents that the law required the Commission to provide.
“As a commission, we would not have sent anything to Parliament without going through the due process,” he said.
Mr Ayisi advised the stakeholders and the indigenes of Ada in the Greater Accra Region to support the project due to its prospects of creating jobs and improving livelihoods.
Mr George Mireku Duker, the Deputy Minister of Lands and Natural Resources, said Electrochem Ghana had duly signed all the needed licenses on the recommendation by the Commission.
He urged the parties to unite and make good use of the vast natural resource to help develop the communities along the lagoon, the Ada State, and the country.
Dr Daniel McKorley, the Chairman of McDan Group of Companies and owner of Electrochem Ghana, said the company would build the capacity of local miners and integrate them in their operations through the communal mining concept.
“We are making the people of Ada a part of the project, re-engineering their improvised ‘galamsey’ pans into standard community pans of modern architecture for more people to mine alongside our commercial mining,” he said.
“The good thing is that we will continue to scientifically look at the way they produce the salt to ensure it meets the standards required on the international market, give them free access to sea water through our reservoirs and provide them ready market after mining.”