Former mining areas at Gold Fields’ Tarkwa Mine are being restored and put to agricultural use, raising the possibility of giving mined land a productive economic purpose beyond extraction.
According to the Gold Fields, rehabilitated areas are being used to grow rubber, coconut, oil palm, cashew, citrus and mango, turning parts of land previously used for mining into agricultural areas.
The rehabilitation programme has also seen more than 818,000 trees planted since 1998 across old rock dumps and waste sites.
The agricultural work forms part of a wider $46 million investment made since 2016 to restore land affected by mining at Tarkwa.
The use of rehabilitated land for agriculture provides an alternative purpose for parts of the mine site, although the scale of agricultural production and its economic impact are not detailed in the information provided by the company.
The rehabilitation process involves restoring mined areas and establishing vegetation before some of the land is put to productive use.
The programme extends beyond agriculture. Gold Fields’ conservation teams use camera traps to monitor wildlife, with the company reporting sightings of the Tree Pangolin, Mona Monkey, Bosman’s Potto and Royal Antelope in rehabilitated areas.
Water management is another part of the operation’s environmental programme. More than 97% of the water used at the mine is recycled and reused through treatment and recirculation systems, according to Gold Fields.
The company says the system reduces the need for discharges into nearby rivers and streams and helps protect surrounding water sources.
There is also a financial commitment attached to the mine’s eventual closure and restoration. A $107.7 million reclamation bond has been lodged with Ghana’s Environmental Protection Authority (EPA), against an estimated $107.2 million cost of fully restoring the site.
The rehabilitation work is being carried out alongside ongoing mining, with some areas already being transitioned from mining use to agricultural and ecological purposes.
At Tarkwa, the approach provides a practical example of what can happen to mined land after extraction: rather than remaining solely a legacy of mining, restored areas can potentially return to productive uses such as agriculture while natural ecosystems recover.
