Railways Development Minister, John Peter Amewu says the Ghana-Burkina Faso interconnectivity railway line project will be instrumental in the mining of iron ore in the Northern Region.

More than 1.7 billion tonnes of iron ore were discovered in an exploration exercise at Sheini in the Tatale/Sanguli District of the Northern Region.

According to the sector minister, the completion of the project will be key in the mining of the iron ore deposits.

He stated that “The alignment also includes the branch line from Yendi to Sheini where we have excessive and potential prospective iron ore deposit. It is to facilitate the exploitations of the huge iron ore deposits that we have discovered in that area.”

He added that “His Excellency Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo believes that the only way we can transform this country, is when we begin to attach some level of importance to our natural resources and by that, he believes we must begin to refine our natural resources locally and that is where this country is going to.”

The Railways Development Minister made these comments during a conference for the Ghana Burkina Faso Interconnectivity Railway line project.

So far three companies have been shortlisted out of an earlier 12 for the contract to implement the project.

The 1,000km Ghana-Burkina Faso Railway Interconnectivity Project will link Ghana from Tema to Burkina Faso’s capital, Ouagadougou.

Iron ore discovered in Tatale/Sanguli District
The Majority Leader in Parliament and Minister of Parliamentary Affairs, Mr Osei Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu, in 2019 on the floor of parliament, said the volume of the mineral deposit in Ghana was estimated to hit three billion by the end of the exercise.

Mr Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu stated that the discovery of iron ore in commercial volumes was a major boost to the iron and steel industry.