Mahama seeks South Korea partnership to refine Ghana’s critical minerals

President John Dramani Mahama has called for stronger collaboration with South Korea to help Ghana process its critical minerals locally using advanced Korean technology.

The proposal was presented during a high-level meeting with South Korean President Lee Jae‑Myung, where President Mahama highlighted areas of cooperation between the two countries and the economic opportunities in Ghana’s extractive sector.

According to the President, Ghana holds significant deposits of strategic minerals and is already extracting several key resources while new discoveries continue to expand the country’s potential in the sector.

“Ghana like other African countries, has a potential for critical minerals and so currently we’re exploiting bauxite, manganese, and gold, and we’ve discovered vast reserves of lithium, and some nickel, and other rare minerals,” he said.

President Mahama explained that Ghana is interested in partnerships that will enable the country to refine these resources instead of exporting them in raw form. He noted that South Korea’s technological expertise makes it a suitable partner for such collaboration.

“Korea has the technology, and we believe that we can explore these minerals together and not export them in their raw form, but add value to their critical minerals and export them both to Africa and other countries,” he said.

The push for value addition comes at a time when Ghana has introduced a new sliding-scale mineral royalty system to replace the previous flat five-percent rate on gold and lithium. Under the new arrangement, royalties will range between five and 12 percent depending on global commodity prices.

Under this framework, gold producers will pay higher royalties when prices exceed thresholds such as 4,500 dollars per ounce, while lithium royalties will follow the same 5–12 percent band depending on spodumene price ranges. Authorities say the approach is intended to help the country benefit more during periods of strong commodity prices.

Data released by the Bank of Ghana in its Summary of Economic and Financial Data on 27 January 2026 showed Ghana’s export earnings reached 31.1 billion dollars in 2025, up from 19.1 billion dollars in 2024. Gold remained the largest contributor to foreign exchange inflows.

Ghana’s mining sector has also drawn global attention following the discovery of lithium in commercial quantities at the Ewoyaa Lithium Project in the Central Region. The project, being developed by Atlantic Lithium Ltd., contains significant spodumene-bearing resources used in batteries for electric vehicles and other clean-energy technologies.

Government policy now encourages local processing of such minerals to increase revenue, attract investment and strengthen Ghana’s position within the global supply chain for critical minerals.