Ghana is the number-one gold producer in Africa, the sixth in the world and the second-most preferred mining destination for investment in Africa. Ghana has been mining for over 150 years, but the situation is that we have not benefitted from mining compared to other countries in the global spectrum. So the government of Ghana, in this vein, has set up the Minerals Income Investment Fund (MIIF), a specialty sovereign wealth fund dealing mostly with minerals. The whole idea is to develop ways and means in which Ghana can benefit from the entire value delivery system of mining, and garner value from mining as we have seen in countries like South Africa, Canada, Australia, China, etc.
The main things that we do at MIIF are essentially two things. First, we are responsible for all the royalties that come to the government through every single mineral type. We gather all the royalties and re-inject them into the mining space as investment. The other bit has to do with the management of the government of Ghana's equity interest in mining companies.
By January 2024 MIIF should be a $1bn mineral sovereign wealth fund. By 2030 we should be hitting about $6bn to $8bn as a fund, and this will allow us to add even more value to the mining sector in Ghana. We are looking at 28 mineral types by 2030, which would mean that Ghana would become a significant player and focal point for investment in Africa when it comes to mining. At MIIF we are prepared to support investors coming into Ghana as co-investors across the value chain of all these minerals.
We have invested about $40m in Asante Gold Corporation, which is listed on the Canadian and German stock exchanges, and now the Ghana Stock Exchange. We are investing $30m in salt. Salt has 14,000 uses, and Ghana is looking at how we are able to invest in this to expand the value chain of salt usage. We are looking at pharmaceuticals, bicarbonate soda, food preservation, textiles and aluminium casings.
We are investing in ElectroChem. ElectroChem is managing the 41,000-acre Ada Songor space. The biggest salt production company in sub-Saharan Africa, Walvis Bay in Namibia, has about 16,700 acres of salt. What we have in Ghana, at a potential of 99.9%
industrial salt, or purity, is 41,000 acres. That is more than twice the size of Walvis Bay. Ghana is positioning itself as the number-one salt producer in sub-Saharan Africa There is the potential of Ghana making about $1bn every year from salt alone. We are investing over $35m in the lithium space in Ghana.
The recently discovered lithium find in the Central Region is called the Ewoyaa project by Atlantic Lithium. This project should come on stream by December 2024, and it is in the top-10 lithium finds in the world. There are a number of opportunities in the newly discovered lithium space in Ghana. Feldspar is a by-product of lithium.
Feldspar is used to produce ceramics. Ghana is a major exporter of ceramic products. This provides good opportunities for investors not only in Ghana, but outside Ghana. MIIF is positioning itself to invest in the processing of lithium in Ghana and support investors that will be setting up battery-ion factories in the lithium space.
Ghana, to a very large extent, is placing a lot of emphasis on sustainable mining and ESG. Ghana has signed up to the Minamata Convention on Mercury. Ghana has also developed the Energy Transition Framework, which is meant to work on the decarbonisation of the sector between 2022 and 2070. We at MIIF have developed an ESG framework to ensure that our investment is pivoted on ESG.
MIIF is supporting brilliant women in mining communities to give them full scholarships, both for post-graduate and undergrad, at the University of Mines and Technology. We will be looking for 400 women a year throughout Ghana from mining communities who seek to study engineering or any other mining course. This is extremely important because of the gender disparity in mining in Ghana. Small-scale mining contributes up to 40% of Ghana's total gold output.
That is about $2.4bn every year. MIIF is seeking to develop this sector through a formalisation programme called the Small-Scale Mining Incubation Programme in four main avenues: provision of working capital in the form of equity injection; support in corporate governance and environmental, sustainable mining practices; access to market through the MIIF gold trade desk; and traceability mechanisms that ensure we all know where the gold is coming from. We have made an initial investment of $30m as pilots supporting 10 small-scale mining companies.
We are looking at about 200 companies in the next 10 years. This is going to be the most revolutionary investment in the artisanal mining sector globally. Definitely the best we will see in Africa.
