The Minister of Solid Minerals Development, Dele Alake, says the federal government is working to instill more transparency in its mining licensing processes.
He gave the commitment at the launch of revised guidelines for the production of Community Development Agreements in the Solid Minerals sector.
Section 116 of the Nigerian Minerals and Mining Act 2007 provides that mining companies enter into community Development agreements, CDAs, with their host communities.
The agreement is to spell out in clear terms, the beneficiation of the host community such as scholarships, employment, construction of schools and good roads.
CDAs serve as tools for transferring social and economic benefits of resource extraction to communities.
Over the years however, mining CDA have been replete with enormous gaps across communities.
Limited public knowledge is also a major concern about CDAs.
The collaboration between the Ministry of Solid Minerals Development and Centre LSD is to have a revised document that will meet international best practices.
Leading actors in the sector gave thumbs up for the initiative to revive CDAs.
Minister of Solid Minerals Development, Dele Alake while delivering his keynote speech spoke on the necessity of the revised guidelines and the determination of the Bola Tinubu administration to make the mining sector the greatest contributor to the nation’s gross domestic product.
The administration is more concerned with the transparency of the mining licensing procedure in the coming days.
Highpoint of the event was the unveiling of the Revised Document.
The revised guidelines recommend among others, Law review leveraging specific good practices of other climes, particularly amendment of the mining act 2007 and the minerals and mining regulations 2011.
