Abstract

This paper uses risk assessment of socio-economic and environmental indicators to develop criteria for apportionment (AP) of funds to communities impacted by mining activities within a Forest Reserve environment in Ghana. A t-test statistic of assessment data shows that factors such as; cost of living, health conditions, air pollution, water contamination, land degradation and distance (D km) are significant. Ratings of the factors using a 1-5 intensity scale to determine risk values (RV) for communities indicate that RV of 25 requires no remediation, while (25-RV) is remediation factor. A long-term AP criterion using the ranked risk (RR) values is defined by the equation AP_RR%=7.45-0.233(RR) with R² of 0.961. Based on this criterion, communities D and S which are located at 1.5 and 16.1km from the mining focus have AP_RR values of 7.23% and 2.26%, respectively. AP_RR% in relation to distance is defined by the equation AP_RR%=7.22-0.281(D) with R² of 0.647. RR-dependent distance equation (AP_D %) is used to deduce a short-term criterion defined by K*AP_D%=4.13-0.097(RR), where K is a constant. The expression of (AP_RR-K*AP_D) represents the residual apportionment required after a long-term assessment. The findings in this research demonstrate well-defined patterns that can be replicated for similar future projects.

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