Assessing the impact of small-scale mining activities on land use land cover and the sustainability of mining practices in Ghana: A case of the Atiwa East district

Small-scale mining (SSM), though an important economic activity, has caused extensive damage to water bodies, forest, agricultural land, threatening sustainability of man and the immediate environment. This is largely attributed to destructive and wasteful mining practices dominating the sector. This study assessed the impact of SSM activities on land use land cover and the sustainable practices in Ghana, using the Atiwa East District as case study. The study specifically focused on the spatio-temporal changes in land use land cover, the impact of SSM on land use land cover as well as the factors that influence sustainability in the sector. Two hundred and ten (210) respondents were selected for the study. The supervised spectral angle mapper classification algorithm in QGIS together with visual interpretation was used to classify images into various Land Use Land Cover (LULC) categories.

Results from the study show that between the years of 2007–2021, about 3578.69 acres of farmland and about 1127.93 acres of forest were lost to SSM and other land uses, such as built-up, while SSM gained about 3708.985 acres of land. The study also observed that managerial commitments and education and training have positive relationships with the adoption of sustainable mining practices and this was at 1 %, 5 % and 10 % significant levels. The study therefore concludes that management of SSM firms should be committed in adopting sustainable measures in their operations while monitoring institutions also ensure strict compliance to standards to achieve sustainability in the sector.