The government of Guinea has issued an environmental compliance certificate to an Australian company to go ahead with its plan to mine gold within an area that’s home to critically endangered western chimpanzees.

In January, Guinea’s Ministry of the Environment and Sustainable Development accepted the environmental and social impact assessment that Predictive Discovery had commissioned for its Bankan Gold project, located in the northeast corner of Upper Niger National Park (PNHN).

The mining company, which trades as PDI on the Australian Securities Exchange, estimates the area holds 3.05 million ounces of gold, which it says makes Bankan the largest gold discovery in West Africa in a decade. 

The 1,767-page impact assessment report, however, notes that the planned mining operations will have long-lasting impacts on wildlife such as the western chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes verus), even beyond the life cycle of the mine. It notes that chimpanzees are widely present in the region, with a stronghold in the core conservation area of PNHN, called the Mafou Forest.

While the core is around 18 kilometers (11 miles) from the planned mining site, the report says there’s evidence the mine’s exploration operations since the start of the Bankan project in 2020 have already caused the displacement of seven to 15 individual chimps and disturbance to others.

The mining activities are expected to worsen habitat loss and disturbance to the chimps beyond the project area, and impact groundwater levels for decades to come, the assessment report says.

The initial Bankan project area extended into the park’s buffer zone, but PDI spokesperson Sandra Bates told Mongabay by email that during the discussions for the certificate of environmental compliance, the company had told the environment ministry it would “relinquish all of the portion of the Project permits that is located within the Buffer Zone of the Park.”

Mining will take place in an area marked as the “peripheral zone” on PDI‘s map.

According to PNHN’s 2006-2010 development plan, two buffer zones surround the Mafou core area. The first one, immediately adjacent to the core, has strict restrictions on human activities. It’s followed by the second buffer, or transition zone, which allows for some development activities. What PDI refers to as the “peripheral zone” appears to be this transition zone.

Aboubacar Samoura, the environment ministry official in charge of national parks and wildlife, told Mongabay there were initial concerns about the location of the operation, but the ministry pushed the company to withdraw from the buffer zone. “It is true that it is worrying when we talk about a deposit in a protected area, but on the other hand, we must be positive.”

Directly after receiving its environmental compliance certificate, PDI submitted its application for a mining license on Jan. 31; if granted, it will start operations as early as 2026.

Banner image of a western chimpanzee by Christoph Wurbel via Flickr (CCBY-NC-SA2.0).