Because a buyer who knows how to check is a buyer worth having. Every item below can be used against Nova Parameter as easily as against anyone else — that is the point. If we cannot survive your due diligence, you should not be sending us money.
Only a licensed dealer and exporter may lawfully export gold or diamonds from Sierra Leone. Everything else is secondary to this.
Never verify using contact details the seller gives you. A phone number on a seller's website, a "government contact" they introduce you to, a WhatsApp number for an alleged official — all trivially faked. Source the authority's contact details yourself, independently, and call them cold.
This is a thirty-second test that filters most of the field.
The governing statute is the Mines and Minerals Development Act, 2022 (No. 16 of 2022). It repealed and replaced the Mines and Minerals Act 2009 and was implemented on 12 May 2023.
If a supplier's website or contract says their operations are governed by the "Mines and Minerals Act 2009", they are citing a statute repealed over three years ago. It does not necessarily make them a fraud — but it tells you they are working from copied material rather than lived compliance. At the time of writing, several sites ranking on page one for these keywords still cite the 2009 Act.
Sources: NMA Legal & Regulatory Instruments; SierraLII.You cannot fake having stood in the PMTD. Ask these:
Someone who exports regularly answers these without pausing. Someone who has never exported will deflect, get vague, or tell you the questions do not matter.
There is one answer: the Precious Minerals Trading Directorate, Bank of Sierra Leone building, 2nd floor, Siaka Stevens Street, Freetown. That is where Schedule B is collected and where goods are presented, assayed, valued and sealed.
If a seller proposes assaying at a private office, a hotel, a "partner laboratory", or anywhere that is not the Directorate — the transaction they are describing is not a lawful export.
Equally, all precious minerals for export must depart via the international airport only, with certificate copies deposited with customs at Lungi.
Worth doing before anything else, because it is fast and it is decisive.
Several websites ranking prominently for "gold suppliers in Sierra Leone" and similar terms are not Sierra Leonean operations at all. Check the footer address, the phone country code, the registration. In the course of researching this page we found sites presenting as Sierra Leone gold suppliers whose published contact addresses were in entirely different countries — and one page marketing Sierra Leone gold that stated in its own body copy that the company was located in Cameroon.
At least one site ranking on these keywords presents itself with the branding of a Sierra Leone government office. The genuine authority is the National Minerals Agency at nma.gov.sl. Government business is conducted on .gov.sl domains. Treat lookalike domains accordingly.
The export procedure has a feature that quietly protects you: the exporter must show bank inflow evidence covering the export value before goods leave. Foreign currency has to be demonstrably imported through accredited commercial banks. Legitimate transactions are therefore already built around traceable banking.
Which means:
| Signal | What it usually means |
|---|---|
| Price below global spot | Not selling gold. Gold trades globally. Discounts to spot do not exist for real metal. |
| "99.99% pure" raw material | Impossible or refined elsewhere. Alluvial output is assayed to actual purity, not four-nines by default. |
| Advance fee before assay | Classic fraud. No legitimate stage requires this. |
| Cites "Mines and Minerals Act 2009" | Stale information. Repealed 12 May 2023. |
| Assay anywhere but PMTD | Not a lawful export. |
| Cannot name the three valuers | Has never exported diamonds. |
| Address outside Sierra Leone | Verify hard. They may be a broker at best. |
| Cash / crypto only | Avoiding the banking control. |
| "Direct from the miners, no licence needed" | Breach of the Act. You cannot lawfully export it. |
| Resists your due diligence | Answer received. |
Copy these. Send them verbatim. The replies will sort your shortlist quickly.
"Before we discuss volumes or price, please send: (1) your exporter's licence name and number, (2) the statute under which you're licensed, (3) confirmation that assay and sealing will take place at the PMTD, Bank of Sierra Leone building, Siaka Stevens Street. I will be verifying the licence with the NMA directly."
"Who is required to be present at assay, and how much notice does PMTD require? For diamonds — whose valuation determines the duty payable?"
"Confirm no funds are payable before assay is complete, and that the transaction will run through accredited commercial banking with inflow evidence as required for export. Please confirm a numbered receipt will be issued for the purchase."
Nova Parameter SL LTD publishes this checklist knowing full well that buyers will apply it to us. That is intentional. The suppliers who fear an informed buyer are precisely the suppliers you should avoid — and we would rather compete on verifiability than on adjectives.
Buying bullion, sourcing rough, or arranging lawful export — our desk in Bo answers every serious enquiry within one business day.