A mining consultant, Wisdom Gomashie, has challenged claims that Ghana’s reported $214 million loss under its Domestic Gold Purchase Programme reflects a necessary policy cost.
He argues that the figures mask deeper structural challenges and overstate the novelty of recent reforms.
Gomashie said assertions by the economic analyst Senyo Hosi that the Ghana Gold Board (GOLDBOD) has significantly curbed gold smuggling since its launch in April 2025 are misleading and rely on selective use of trade data.
He said gold smuggling in Ghana was a long-standing structural problem rather than one concentrated in 2022 and 2023, citing reports which estimate that the country lost more than $6 billion to illicit gold exports between 2013 and 2016.
“To suggest that smuggling worsened only around 2022-2023 distorts the historical record,” Gomashie said, adding that trade data showed fluctuations over many years, influenced by policy changes such as export taxes.
He accused Hosi of citing United Nations Comtrade data selectively, in particular using 2022 figures to support claims of rising smuggling while overlooking improvements recorded in 2023 after the government cut gold export taxes from 3% to 1.5% and fully implemented the Domestic Gold Purchase Programme (DGPP).
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Gomashie said discrepancies in artisanal gold exports to the United Arab Emirates, a major destination for Ghana’s small-scale gold, pre-dated recent years and had narrowed before 2025, except for a spike in 2022 that he attributed to higher export taxes.
He argued that the current operations of GOLDBOD are a continuation of earlier efforts to formalise the gold business, rather than a break from the past, noting that the DGBP was introduced before GOLDBOD’s creation and had already contributed significantly to Ghana’s gold reserves.
According to Gomashie, gold accumulated in the earlier phase of the programme accounted for about 22 tonnes, representing roughly 58% of Ghana’s gold reserves by October 2025, valued at more than $3 billion.
“GOLDBOD cannot claim novelty for reforms whose foundations were laid years earlier,” he said, adding that the reported $214 million loss in the first nine months of 225 under the same programme remains unresolved.
Gomashie also questioned claims that a rise in official gold exports from about 63 tonnes in 2023 to 101 tonnes in 2025 proves that smuggling has reduced sharply, saying the higher output figures could also reflect high global prices for gold, stimulating increased artisanal production.
“Higher export volumes alone do not demonstrate that smuggling has been eliminated,” he said.
GOLDBOD previously said that the reported loss reflects the cost of paying competitive prices to local miners to discourage illegal exports, a strategy it says has helped boost reserves and stabilise the currency.
However, critics say the programme’s financial performance and governance require closer scrutiny.
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