The Garimpeira Mining Permit (PLG), an instrument that should function as a regulation for artisanal mining, has been used as a front for large-scale fraud in the activity in Brazil. This is one of the conclusions of a study that Greenpeace Brazil will publish in full this Monday (June 1).
The organization’s investigation reported having analyzed 187 mining processes in the states of Pará, Mato Grosso and Rondônia between 2018 and 2026 and that it found an “alarming” picture: of these processes, 98 are PLGs that presented serious irregularities, concentrating 97% of all the gold declared in the sample.
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Greenpeace Brasil says that these permissions were responsible for the sale of 25.3 tons of gold, which is equivalent to approximately R$18.4 billion in current values as of May 2026. And that 94% of these PLGs were classified as ghost mines or industrial-scale operations.
The study highlights that, in periods of economic and geopolitical instability, gold once again occupies a strategic position in the global market. “Historically associated with financial security, the metal strengthens in scenarios marked by wars, economic crises and international uncertainties. But behind the shine, hides the anatomy of a fraud that is destroying the heart of the largest tropical forest on the planet”, comments Greenpeace.
The Garimpeira Mining Permit is a type of mineral extraction regime granted by the National Mining Agency (ANM). Created in 1989 with the aim of regulating and controlling mining activity, but the organization denounces that PLG ended up captured by illicit gold laundering schemes in the Amazon. “This misuse goes far beyond a simple administrative irregularity. It involves fraud and criminal conduct.”
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The loophole used is that, as the law does not require prior mineral research, any declaration of the amount of gold extracted in the area can be accepted as real, since there is no geological data to dispute – even when, in fact, the gold was extracted illegally from Indigenous Lands or Conservation Units.
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“Ghost” mining on an industrial scale
The report details the two main fraud tactics identified in the investigation, ghost mining and industrial-scale mining.
The “ghosts are areas that declare tons of gold production, but satellite images and overflights show that the forest is intact, or with little mining activity – which is incompatible with the high volume of gold extraction declared there. “It is this false declaration of origin that washes the illegal gold and places the metal on the legal market.”
Cases of ghost mining account for 29.6% of the 98 PLGs with irregularities and represent 48.5% of the 25.3 tons of gold declared in these permits.
Industrial-scale mining is an arrangement in which multiple independent mining processes – mainly PLGs – granted in the same territorial area are explored in a way that suggests a single operation. “The maneuver not only escapes the strictest environmental licensing and rules applied to industrial mining, but it can also facilitate the laundering of illegally mined gold.”
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Cases of industrial-scale mining account for 66.3% of the 98 PLGs with irregularities and represent 49.2% of the 25.3 tons of gold declared in the permits.
