On Monday, September 28, the President of Burkina Faso, Captain Ibrahim Traoré inaugurated the country’s first state-owned gold refinery. We are so proud of Burkina Faso and its people, the land of the men of integrity is building itself step by step, showing us the way forward. The country opened its first gold refinery so it could extract it, refine it on its very own soil, certify it, and benefit from it for the whole pipeline from the soil all the way to the end product that is the gold bar, while creating jobs for its very own people. The refinery is the first of its kind in Burkina Faso, built to the highest international standards for transforming gold into ingots with a purity of 99.99%. It is set to refine 164 tonnes per year at the beginning, growing to at least 500 tonnes of gold later. As I heard the speech of members of the Faso government, I was so proud when they said we will refine our own gold, with our own capacities. The power is shifting! Such an amazing time to be alive! I remember when we kept talking about Thomas Sankara and Burkina Faso on our blog, and how some were laughing… today, we are proud of Burkina Faso, and we never stopped being proud of Sankara’s brothers and sisters. La patrie ou la mort, nous vaincrons! This reminds us of what Sankara talked about, “The National Economy: Independent, Self-Sufficient, and Planned at the Service of Democratic and Popular Society” in “We are Heirs of the World’s Revolutions, Speeches from the Burkina Faso Revolution 1983-87” .

Extracts below are from TeleSur. Enjoy!

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President Ibrahim Traoré highlighted the strategic importance of this initiative, which aims to control the entire value chain of the extractive industry, starting with gold.

The refinery, inaugurated this Monday, is expected to generate more wealth, create jobs, and improve the control of domestic financial flows.

“In everything related to the extractive industry, we want to have the entire value chain under control, and we are starting with gold,” Traoré emphasized. “As I mentioned before, there are many other metals in our subsurface that we want to extract, but we want to control everything down to the smallest detail,” he added.

Traoré stressed that Burkina Faso’s gold should be processed and certified within the country. “Refining gold in our territory will generate more wealth, create qualified jobs, strengthen the traceability of our production, and improve control over financial flows. Additionally, it will enable us to combat illicit practices more effectively, such as fraud, smuggling, and money laundering,” he stated.

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