The Economist: How can Uganda export so much more gold than it mines?

Deep in pits hewn from the earth dozens of teenage boys slam their hammers into the rock. Other men pan the crushed ore by hand in tubs filled with water and mercury. Uganda does not have many gold mines and most, like this one in Busia, in the east of the country, are neither sophisticated nor especially productive. Yet this small east African nation exports a fantastic trove of the yellow metal.

According to official statistics, gold exports surged to $514m in 2018 from less than $10m a decade ago. Last year gold surpassed coffee as Uganda’s biggest earner of foreign currency…

Click here to read the full article.