Member Info for Bukowski750

I see "crappy performance " as an opportunity to back up the truck. We're not the same kiddo.

Projection is strong here i see. Can anyone point me to the Kefi EIA? Who deals with the EIA local or central government, cheers kiddos.

Qnard when I research a potential investment community relations and whether or not the locals want a mining operation is top of my list. So I'm simply researching that.

Where'd you get 6p and a remortgage from kiddo, no need to make things up now. What are your thoughts on Oromia as a jurisdiction m8? Any thoughts on permits and community relations?

DvHarrison wee laddie, if i am filtered how do you know my post is boring......having a little peek behind the curtain is it kiddo?

Not alluding to KEFI being correct in the slightest, kiddo, what a bizarre thing to type!

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Gold routes extend throughout the Horn, usually destined for the comparatively lax oversight in Dubai and India. Even from landlocked Tigray, shipments reportedly weave through Amhara with "implanted" complicit officials before entering Sudan.

Alternative routes lead north through Afar to Somaliland and east Africa. Shipments even depart Tigray disguised among NGO vehicles or code-4 government transports. Once consolidated in Addis, cargo planes discreetly transport sealed shipments bypassing customs at Bole Airport.

Warehouses store such cargos for international buyers, providing opportunity for ministerial "business". Officials reportedly acquire gold domestically or from foreign smugglers like DRC, reselling shipments abroad in dollars to capitalize on local demand. Payments often combine dollar and birr.

Illicit Gold Rush: Explaining Ethiopia's Surge in Informal Mining

Several underlying factors have contributed to the rise of illicit mining in Ethiopia in recent years. Firstly, the decentralization of mining rights and concessions following the 2018 political changes has weakened regulatory oversight. Nearly all regional states reclaimed mining licenses within their borders, placing control under regional governments with relatively less capacity for regulation and industry support. This has left resources vulnerable to misallocation, embezzlement and armed group dominance.

Secondly, the military has increasingly commandeered vast smuggling networks crisscrossing the country and extending into neighbors and beyond. These networks reach the Middle East, China and elsewhere, allowing contraband to flow with decreasing impediment. A third dynamic augmenting the problem is instability in the Horn of Africa region. Conflicts in neighboring countries, as well as internal strife, have drawn foreign illegal miners into Ethiopia's loosely governed mining areas. For instance, turmoil in Sudan has created fertile ground for booming contraband exchanges, with Ethiopians, Sudanese and others from across Africa as well as further afield increasingly involved in the trade.

Among the most influential - yet hidden - actors in Ethiopia's gold sector are the so-called "aggregators". Licensed by the government to collect gold from miners and supply it to the central bank, which alone can export the commodity, aggregators range from individual traders to sizable mining companies. However, sources indicate most aggregator licenses are awarded based on political connections rather than merit, with senior federal and regional officials often affiliated with license holders.

Many aggregators allegedly bypass their mandate to sell to the central bank, instead using their position to clandestinely smuggle gold abroad. "Corrupt officials facilitate this contraband by ensuring bypassing of airports and border checkpoints," say sources. With security personnel, customs and others implicated, vast amounts of gold are believed to illicitly

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Even license holders are complicit. "They sell three times as much underground to enrich smugglers while symbolically delivering just 400g to renew permits," said the source. Task force members themselves allegedly hijacked the very operations meant to check illicit flows.

Even large licensed miners in Ethiopia allegedly enable gold's slide across porous borders, according to officials in Benishangul Gumuz. "Licensees collect artisanal output yet deliver scant volumes officially. Allied deploys illegal miners too," one claimed, though its lawyers reject such accusations.

Major sites lie near the Sudanese border, siphoning bullion through informal circuits. Asosa, Kurmuk, Sherkole and Menge head the region's gold-producing zones. During wet seasons, access becomes tricky yet smuggling persists unabated.

Much of Benishangul's gold-bearing districts lay near the Sudanese border, according to one official. Major hub towns like Kurmuk and Sherkole function largely as border markets alongside numerous borderline sites. Menge sits a mere 30 birr transport from the border. With borders so porous and ungoverned that "people trade across without control," smuggling gold remains "very simple" as most transport gold informally to Sudanese markets, returning at night.

This makes enforcement notoriously difficult. Local elites allegedly bankroll informal mining while retaining permits to self-collect, channeling output their way. As artisanal extraction expands beyond oversight into frontier lands, such networks consolidate.

However, Wondemagegnehu Gebre-Sellassie, a mining lawyer at Wonde & Associates, pushed back, arguing that "mining companies take samples from project sites, and blaming them as taking out gold is incorrect."

Gold from across northern Ethiopia allegedly leaks through Benishangul, according to sources. Gold from Amhara, Humera and Tigray regions passes to Sudan, they state. While outflows from Oromia face some hurdles from OLF forces controlling key passages, informal flows persist through certain borderlands. "Tongo district straddles Oromia and Benishangul yet sits near Sudan, enabling smuggling," said one official.

Substantial illicit shipments drain Benishangul given black markets consistently pay three times over official rates. Miners nominally supply 1kg monthly to the National Bank of Ethiopia purely to renew permits but funnel three times that amount underground. With such distorted pricing that heavily penalizes formal supply chains, miners and smugglers rationally pursue profits over official channels. As artisanal production penetrates ever more remote and uncontrolled border areas, regulatory failures cede yet more economic ground to organized criminal networks.

Networks allegedly divert over 60,000kg gold annually across porous borders. Nearly half passes through Sudan, aided by trans-regional facilitation. Tantalum and lithium ores also stream towards Kenya.

Gold routes extend throughou

from birrmetrics.com

underground empires: gold cartels and the geopolitics of informality in africa

april 16, 2025

ethiopia's porous borders and patchy rule of law have enabled a thriving illicit gold trade. informal buyers with deep pockets and weak government oversight have allowed the trade to flourish, with gold flowing from the horn of africa to the middle east.

more than just a commodity, gold also serves as de facto currency in the informal ethiopian economy. market players use the revenues to finance a grey import business, linking the underground gold network to currency movements.

after being collected from tributaries across the diverse regional states, gold exits the country through many informal border crossings. questionable governance and intersecting social difficulties have combined to produce a burgeoning illicit mining sector that threatens stability.

in a recent address, prime minister abiy ahmed highlighted the problem, noting that asosa and shire have emerged as hubs for contraband gold.

ethiopia's central bank once received up to 20kg of gold per day from artisanal miners across the country's diverse regions. but much slips through the cracks. extrapolating from national bank of ethiopia's intake suggests at least 10-20kg daily goes unrecorded in each region—up to an estimated 65,000kg annually leaving the country illicitly.

official data paints a stark picture. tigray supplied over 26,000kg annually to the central bank before conflict erupted. now officials concede it all flows underground. "contraband has emerged as the sector's second major problem, after illegal mining. both legal and illegal miners fuel smuggling networks," says fisaha miresa of tigray's mining bureau.

incentives are stacked against official channels. gold prices in clandestine markets routinely surpass the central bank's offers, undermining its ability to absorb production. "more than 20 *****als are extracted yearly in tigray but zero reaches addis ababa officially," laments fisaha.

artisanal suppliers once provided over 8,000kg annually to the national bank of ethiopia. but intake has more than halved in recent years, suggesting the deficit—now over 5,000kg—leaks abroad.

ethiopia's illicit gold trade has surged as artisanal mining expands into remote areas and foreign interlopers penetrate insecure borderlands. formal producers also increasingly divert bullion from official channels.

intake at the national bank of ethiopia has sharply declined. one benishangul gumuz mining official said gold deliveries to its assosa branch have dried up despite exchange-rate moves aimed at incentivising sales.

temporary taskforces launched with federal support scored some successes intercepting contraband but have since gone dormant. officials anonymously reported daily seizures averaging 2kg in one area alone, just a fraction of the stream bound for sudan.

even license holders are complicit. "they sell three times as much

Pretty lame Robbie boy, Captain I only post articles that fit my narrative.

Regarding the four month time line: this is a Mudit Goenka time line , the Singapore based New head of corporate finance...and he hasn't missed a time line yet! Ex Bank of America Merrill Lynch brought in to sort funding and I reckon he'll do a fantastic job! All Imho of course.

Hey crazy town, if you think that Chatham House article - the world renowned international affairs experts - is total garbage, then perhaps you do live in crazy town. There's basket cases, proper basket cases, then the Oromia Region.....IMHO of course!

More time in Ethiopia than anywhere else.....how long is that then kiddo? So he doesn't live there, got it. When was the last time he was on site? Any photos of him on site?

Seriously tho have any of you given a thought as to why a half tidy gold deposit hasn't been developed since 1931 ? Does Harry live in Ethiopia? Ideally you want the CEO living and working in country....when was the last time Hazza had his boots on the ground at Kapi?

Research kiddo. Maybe give it a whirl sometime.

Matey boy is comparing Tigray and Ethiopia to England and Scotland and I'm the one everyone's rushing to filter ROFLMFAO mate they are called AK47 jurisdictions for a good reason, you may get a Scotsman throwing a can of Irn Bru at you at the very worst!

Perhaps you better read it again kiddo and pay particular attention to the mention of Oromia region, which in the grand scheme of things is a relative stones throw to Sudan!

Soz but my phone seems incapable of copying a whole article. Anyway, I think I will personally steer well clear, like well, well well clear of investing in Ethiopia! But that's just my humble opinion and not investment advice!

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recent conflict in a Rahwa gold mine in northwestern Tigray resulted in over 20 deaths.

Related content

Securitizing the Ethiopia–Sudan border: How cross-border conflict is shaping trade and the control of land

Other conflict-prone regions are also seeing an expansion of the illicit gold sector, with Benishangul and Oromia regions ‘officially’ barely producing a quarter of the amounts projected by the government. A Canadian company agreed to invest $500m over 15 years in exploiting gold reserves around the small town of Kurmuk in Benishangul, along the Sudanese border. But encroachment by illicit miners has prevented access to the site, and the involvement of regional officials and local militants has left the federal government unable to act. There are reports of massive extraction taking place, with gold again being smuggled out via Sudan to the UAE.

Keen to prevent the loss of hundreds of millions of dollars every year, the Ethiopian government is trying to curb illegal mining. Cracking down on the illicit market, incentivizing legal suppliers, and amending restrictive and ambiguous laws are measures the government is taking.

However, contested authority between federal, regional and local administrations has paved the way for opportunistic, nepotistic, and criminal elements to profit, which fuels armed conflict. As such, the federal government’s ability to impose peace and security is uncertain at best.

The transnational networks of gold

These state and non-state elites also cooperate and compete for power in transnational spaces. Sudan is the primary recipient of illicit gold from Ethiopia due to its proximity to Ethiopia’s gold belt. Illicit gold from Benishangul, Gambela, Oromia, Tigray and parts of southern Ethiopia flows into Sudan via a porous border with the help of smugglers and brokers, facilitated by conflict in Ethiopia’s Tigray region and in Sudan.

The illicit gold networks in Sudan have flourished in its war economy. Profits generated by the smuggling of gold sustain the war efforts of armed actors.

Other smuggling routes traverse Afar to Eritrea and Somaliland, and the Guji area near the Kenyan border. Regional airports have also become transit points for illicit gold, which is sent to destinations like Uganda and then re-exported to the UAE.

The illicit gold networks in Sudan have flourished in its war economy. Profits generated by the smuggling of gold from and through Ethiopia, Eritrea, Uganda and as far as the DRC, alongside domestic Sudanese production, sustain the war efforts of armed actors, notably the Sudanese Armed Forces and Rapid Support Forces.

But it is the UAE that is the ultimate destination for much of Africa’s smuggled gold, including Ethiopia’s. According to a recent report by Swiss Aid, 2,569 metric tonnes of undeclared gold from Africa, worth a staggering $115 billion, ended up there between 2012 and 2022. The UAE’s questionable import procedu

arrive from www.chathamhouse.org published september 2024:

despite an end to the active conflict in the tigray region, ethiopia’s political and security crisis is deepening. much of the country’s insecurity is linked to competition over natural resources, which has fuelled land disputes and intensified cross-border smuggling, driven inter-communal conflict, and aggravated environmental hazards.

the expansion of ethiopia’s illicit gold sector

ethiopia has substantial gold reserves, particularly in the areas bordering sudan. these reserves made up more than 95 per cent of the country’s $428 million in mineral exports between 2023–24. ethiopia officially exported a high of 12 metric tonnes of gold between 2011–12, a figure that fell to 4.2 tonnes in 2023–24, despite the emergence of new gold projects and the expansion of artisanal, or small-scale, mining.

gold mining is increasingly informal and outside of federal government control. several large-scale gold projects have been ‘in the pipeline’ for over a decade without starting official production. some have been overtaken by illegal exploration, extraction and smuggling operations, often in collusion with various government and non-government actors.

gold mining in ethiopia is increasingly informal and outside of federal government control.

confidential reports suggest that some foreign investors and ethiopian geologists possess more detailed mining data than the government. artisanal mining employs at least 1.5 million people (74 per cent of miners) and accounts for 65 per cent of mining foreign exchange earnings.

ethiopia’s internal conflicts – regional autonomy fuels illicit trade

of ethiopia’s regions, tigray leads the way in exploration and commercial licensing, with over 90 licensed gold mining companies. tigray was among the biggest suppliers of gold to the national bank of ethiopia before the war, with about 26 *****als (2.6 metric tonnes) of gold annually, valued at around $100 million. since the tigray war, much of the region’s gold has instead been smuggled – with estimates that nationally, this amounts to as much as 6 tonnes of gold annually, significantly more than current official exports.

multiple non-state actors, including leaders of the tigray defense forces (tdf), foreign nationals, and local businesspeople are involved. control over gold has been one of the reasons impacting the recent internal split within the leadership of the tigray people’s liberation front (tplf), the dominant party in the region.

reports suggest that tdf leaders and some members of the tplf oversee most of the illicit mining, with gold smuggled out of ethiopia through sudan, to the uae. this plunder of gold ultimately harms the tigrayan public, as the resource should be used to rebuild the region destroyed by a devastating war. equally worrying, the gold rush in tigray is becoming increasingly violent. a recent conflict in a rahwa gold mine in nor