African gold smuggling amounts to more than 30 billion dollars a year, most of it to the United Arab Emirates, where it is refined and then sold around the world, reveals a report published last week.
The data comes from a report by Swissaid, a development aid organization based in Switzerland, and indicates that in 2022, gold worth 30 billion dollars left the African continent illegally.
According to Lusa, the main destinations for African gold were the United Arab Emirates, Turkey and Switzerland.
The report indicates that between 32% and 41% of the gold produced in Africa was not declared, using metrics between what is declared and what subsequently circulates on the market.
In 2022, Ghana was Africa’s largest gold producer, followed by Mali and South Africa and the United Arab Emirates was by far the main destination for smuggled gold, according to the report.
The authors say their aim is to make the African gold trade more transparent and pressure industry participants to do more to make the gold trade traceable and supply chains more accountable.
