The Director of the Mining Department at the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Michael Sandow Ali, has revealed that some guidelines used to regulate mining activities in Ghana's forest reserves were not legally binding, but were developed administratively to address pressing national circumstances.

Speaking at the JoyNews National Dialogue on Repealing L.I. 2462 on Thursday, May 8, Mr.

Ali explained that parts of the country's mining framework-particularly those allowing mining in forest reserves-have long been misunderstood due to limited public education. "This law has been misconstrued.

I believe that because we didn't do enough education on it," he said. "There are some aspects of it that, like A Rocha is saying… but this law was made after 20 years of watching mining in the forest-legalised mining in the forest reserves." Read also: Mahama vows to amend Mining Act for permanent ban on forest mining Mr Ali traced the issue back to the 1990s when approximately 30 companies were granted exploration permits in forest reserves by the Forestry Commission.