
Forging Value at Home: Africa’s Ambitious Push to Refine Its Own Gold
From the Sahel to the Gulf of Guinea, a wave of gold refinery projects is reshaping how Africa captures value from its most storied export. Burkina Faso’s inauguration of its first gold refinery on 28 September 2026 marks the latest milestone in a continent-wide drive to process minerals domestically rather than shipping raw doré abroad.
Yet even as ribbon-cuttings multiply, a familiar problem looms: securing enough feedstock to keep these facilities running near capacity.







