International Council On Mining And Metals Research Articles

Corporate social and environmental reporting in the mining sector: seeking pragmatic and moral forms of legitimacy?

PurposeThe study examines the social and environmental responsibility indicators disclosed by three International Council on Mining and Metals (ICMM) corporate mining members in their social and environmental reporting (SER) from 2006 to 2014. To achieve this aim, the author limits the data two years before (i.e. from 2006 to 2007) and six years after (i.e. from 2009 to 2014) the implementation of the Sustainable Development Framework in the mining sector in 2008.Design/methodology/approachUsing the techniques of content analysis and interpretive textual analysis, this study examines 27 social and environmental responsibility reports published between 2006 and 2014 by three ICMM corporate mining members. The study develops a disclosure index based on the earlier work of Hackston and Milne (1996), together with other disclosure items suggested in the extant literature and considered appropriate for this work. The disclosure index for this study comprised six disclosure categories (“employee”, “environment”, “community involvement”, “energy”, “governance” and “general”). In each of the six disclosure categories, only 10 disclosure items were chosen and that results in 60 disclosure items.FindingsA total of 830 out of a maximum of 1,620 social and environmental responsibility indicators, representing 51% (168 employees, 151 environmental, 145 community involvement, 128 energy, 127 governance and 111 general) were identified and examined in company SER. The study showed that the sample companies relied on multiple strategies for managing pragmatic legitimacy and moral legitimacy via disclosures. Such practices raise questions regarding company-specific disclosure policies and their possible links to the quality/quantity of their disclosures. The findings suggest that managers of mining companies may opt for “cherry-picking” and/or capitalise on events for reporting purposes as well as refocus on company-specific issues of priority in their disclosures. While such practices may appear appropriate and/or timely to meet stakeholders’ needs and interests, they may work against the development of comprehensive reports due to the multiple strategies adopted to manage pragmatic and moral legitimacy.Research limitations/implicationsA limitation of this research is that the author relied on self-reported corporate disclosures, as opposed to verifying the activities associated with the claims by the sample mining companies.Practical implicationsThe findings from this research will help future social and environmental accounting researchers to operationalise Suchman’s typology of legitimacy in other contexts.Social implicationsWith growing large-scale mining activity, potential social and environmental footprints are obviously far from being socially acceptable. Powerful and legitimacy-conferring stakeholders are likely to disapprove such mining activity and reconsider their support, which may threaten the survival of the mining company and also create a legitimacy threat for the whole mining industry.Originality/valueThis study innovates by focusing on Suchman’s (1995) typology of legitimacy framework to interpret SER in an industry characterised by potential social and environmental footprints – the mining industry.

Creating shared value strategies to reach the United Nations sustainable development goals: Evidence from the mining industry

The concept of shared value creation implies that firms can concomitantly create both monetary and social values by focusing on the needs and challenges of society. The definition of “shared value” has been extended within multiple doctrines. Its present expression is obscure, covers numerous other (related) ideas, and lacks factual establishment. The primary purpose of this research is to clarify the meaning of shared value in the mining industry by using terms from the stakeholders’ and strategy literature. To this end, a sample list of 27 mining firms was acquired from the International Council on Mining and Metals (ICMM). In addition, a complete examination based on secondary sources, such as corporate social responsibility reports was made. The evidence shows that the framework proposed requires the following terms to clarify the meaning of shared value: creating shared value strategies, types of processes in the industry, initiatives, stakeholders, and sustainable development goals.

Characteristics and occupational risk assessment of occupational silica-dust and noise exposure in ferrous metal foundries in Ningbo, China.

To investigate the major existing occupational hazards and to assess the occupational health risks for ferrous metal foundries (FMFs) in Ningbo, China. Unified questionnaires were formulated to investigate the information on the basic situations, occupational hazards, and occupational health management for 193 FMFs in Ningbo. Furthermore, we used the semi-quantitative risk assessment model, which was developed by the International Council on Mining and Metals (ICMM), to assess occupational health risks for 59 of 193 the FMFs. The casting process of FMFs in Ningbo was mainly divided into sand casting and investment casting, and silica-dust and noise were the major occupational hazards in both sand casting and investment casting foundries. Silica-dust mainly occurred in industries with such work as sand handling, modeling, falling sand, and sand cleaning, with the median of the permissible concentration-time weighted average (PC-TWA) was 0.80, 1.15, 3.52, 0.83 mg/m3, respectively. The noise mainly existed in industries with such work as sand handling, core making, falling sand, sand cleaning, cutting and grinding, and smelting with median of PC-TWA was 81.72 dB(A), 82.93 dB(A), 90.75 dB(A), 80.18 dB(A), 90.05 dB(A), 82.70 dB(A), respectively. In addition, the results of the ICMM assessment model indicated that 100 and 98.7% of the jobs exposed to silica-dust and noise in 59 FMFs have an "intolerable risk" level of risks of causing pneumoconiosis and noise deaf, respectively. The hazard risk of silica-dust and noise is serious for FMFs in Ningbo. It is necessary to supervise enterprises to improve operating environmental conditions, accelerate the reduction of silica-dust and noise exposure risks, and promote the healthy and sustainable development of the foundry industry.

Impact of engineering renovation on dynamic health risk assessment of mercury in a thermometer enterprise.

The occupational health risk assessments (OHRA) of inorganic mercury (Hg) are rarely reported. We conducted an internal and external exposure monitoring of employees in a thermometer enterprise which experienced the renovation of occupational health engineering, followed by an evaluation on the health risks of Hg exposure with four OHRA methods in order to find out a most suitable model. The results showed that the concentrations of airborne and urinary Hg in all testing positions and subjects obviously decreased after the engineering renovation, meeting the occupational exposure limits (OELs) of China. Subsequently, four OHRA models, namely the models from US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Ministry of Manpower (MOM), International Council on Mining and Metals (ICMM), and Classification of occupational hazards at workplaces Part 2: Occupational exposure to chemicals (GBZ/T 229.2-2010) were applied in the qualitative risk assessment. And the evaluation results of different methods were standardized by risk ratio (RR), which indicated MOM, ICMM risk rating, and GBZ/T 229.2 models were consistent with the order of inherent risk levels in those working processes. The order of RR between four models was: RR EPA > RR ICMM > RR MOM> RR GBZ/T229.2 (P < 0.05). Based on the strict limits of Hg, GBZ/T 229.2, and MOM methods may have more potentials in practical application. Though the working environment has been significantly improved via engineering renovation, it is strongly suggested that the thermometer company conduct more effective risk management covering all production processes to minimize Hg exposure levels and health risk ratings.

A multiple and comprehensive approach to assess health risk in amalgam-exposed Chinese workers.

Fluorescent lamp manufacturing workers have been extensively exposed to mercury (Hg). Our aim was to assess their health risks using several approved occupational health risk assessment methods, and to find out which method was more suitable for identification of occupational health risks. Work locations, and air and urine samples were collected from 530 exposed workers in Zhejiang, China. Based on the calculated exposure doses, health risks and risk ratios (RRs) as health risk indices, were evaluated using: Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Australian, Romanian, Singaporean, International Council on Mining and Metals (ICMM), and Control of Substances Hazardous to Health (COSHH) methods. Among the workers, 86.0% had higher Hg levels than the Chinese occupational exposure limits of 0.02 mg/m3, and 16.7% urine samples were higher than the biological exposure limits of 35.0 μg/g·creatinine. Among workers at the injection, etc. locations, their average RRs, evaluated by the EPA, COSHH and Singaporean methods were 0.97, 0.76, and 0.60, respectively, and were significantly higher than the ICMM (0.39), Australian (0.30) and Romanian (0.29) methods. The RRs from the Singaporean method showed significant correlations with the urinary Hg levels (P < 0.01). In conclusion, the Singaporean method was more appropriate than the others for health risk evaluation because the excessive risks were significantly associated with urinary Hg levels among the workers.

Occupational health risk assessment of the benzene exposure industries: a comprehensive scoring method through 4 health risk assessment models

Benzene is one of the most common occupational hazards in the working environment which was in the list of group 1 carcinogens. This study applied four occupational health risk assessment models: EPA model; MOM model of Singapore; the International Council on Mining and Metals (ICMM) model, and the Technical guide WS/T 777-2021 of China. The models assessed both non-carcinogenic and carcinogenic effects of benzene for 1629 employees in 50 factories in Jiangsu Province (China) who were exposed to benzene in the working environment and analysis the risk between industries by principal component analysis (PCA) method. The highest occupational health hazard of benzene among the five industries is petroleum processing industry, then followed by chemical products manufacturing industry, special equipment manufacturing industry, wood processing and products industry, and at last the pharmaceutical manufacturing industry. The population of abnormal routine blood parameters in the subjects was mostly in the "wood products industry" group, and the concentration of benzene in "wood products industry" group is the lowest in 5 groups. The industries with low exposure concentration have higher blood abnormality rates; this may be caused by the fact that blood damage is more secretive under low occupational health risk.

Quantitative differences between common occupational health risk assessment models.

ObjectivesMethodological studies on occupational health risk assessment (OHRA) models are rarely reported. This study aimed to explore the quantitative differences between common OHRA models.MethodsThe risk ratios (RRs) in five typical industries (leather, wooden furniture manufacturing, printing and dyeing, printing, and garment manufacturing) were investigated using six OHRA models, namely the models from the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Singapore, the Control of Substances Hazardous to Health (COSHH), Australia, Romania, and International Council on Mining and Metals (ICMM). The consistency, correlation, and reliability were evaluated for quantitative differences between the models.ResultsThe order of the RRs obtained from the EPA, Singaporean, and COSHH models in the five industries was consistent with the order of the inherent risk levels in those industries. The EPA and Singaporean models could effectively distinguish the inherent risk levels of risk factors like xylene and ethyl acetate. The order of RR between the six models was: RR EPA > RR COSHH > RR Singaporean > RR Australian > RR Romanian and RR ICMM (P < .05). The EPA model had the weakest correlations with other models. The Singaporean model had positive correlations in RRs with the other models (P＜0.01).ConclusionsThe EPA and Singaporean models exhibited good reliability since they could distinguish the inherent risk of the industry or risk factor and tended to get higher risk levels. The EPA model was independent and the Singaporean model had a good correlation with other models. More studies on OHRA methodology are needed.

Re-Thinking Mining Waste through an Integrative Approach Led by Circular Economy Aspirations

Mining wastes, particularly in the form of waste rocks and tailings, can have major social and environmental impacts. There is a need for comprehensive long-term strategies for transforming the mining industry to move toward zero environmental footprint. “How can the mining industry create new economic value, minimise its social and environmental impacts and diminish liability from mining waste?” This would require cross-disciplinary skills, across the social, environmental, technical, legal, regulatory, and economic domains, to produce innovative solutions. The aim of this paper is to review the current knowledge across these domains and integrate them in a new approach for exploiting or “re-thinking” mining wastes. This approach includes five key areas of social dimensions, geoenvironmental aspects, geometallurgy specifications, economic drivers and legal implications for improved environmental outcomes, and circular economy aspirations, which are aligned with the 10 principles of the International Council on Mining and Metals (ICMM). Applying circular economy thinking to mining waste presents a major opportunity to reduce the liability and increase the value of waste materials arising from mining and processing operations.

Is it time for a Global Mining Initiative 2.0?

From 1998-2002 the world's leading mining and metals companies developed the Global Mining Initiative (GMI) to understand their industry's role in the transition to sustainable development and to ensure its long-term contribution to sustainable development (SD). Since then, the industry has come a long way: For example, operational safety and health have improved significantly, environmental management systems and impact assessments have become the norm, community relations have been established, many mining companies report annually on their contributions to SD and the International Council on Mining and Metals (ICMM) has taken on the recommendations of the GMI as an industry association. However, since the GMI the concept of sustainable development has been evolving from a rather generic and loose definition (“weak sustainability”), to an absolute and strict definition of sustainability, based on the boundaries of our planet (“strong sustainability”). Similarly, other concepts such as corporate social responsibility (CSR) have evolved and even deviated from their initial intentions. This paper presents results from a literature review looking at how far this transition has moved from a scientific debate towards becoming mainstream. Furthermore, it explores, by using qualitative comparison analysis, if the current efforts of the large mining companies are still sufficient or if the industry is again at risk of falling behind societal expectations and hence should once again come together - for a GMI 2.0 - in order to update its approach. We conclude that the mining industry, whilst in a “weak sustainability” position and behind the peer group on climate change and natural capital considerations, is aligned with current societal expectations, expressed through the Sustainable Development Goals, and therefore there is no need for a GMI 2.0 at present.

How credible are mining corporations' sustainability reports? a critical analysis of external assurance under the requirements of the international council on mining and metals

AbstractMember companies of the International Council on Mining and Metals (ICMM) have committed to publish externally assured sustainability reports. This paper evaluates the quality of assurance provided to those companies by analyzing the extent to which a sample of their assurance statements met minimum recommended contents. It also seeks to understand the implications of the recently launched ICMM Assurance Procedure. Nine out of the sixteen companies hired assurance in the period analyzed. Their statements mirrored several quality problems highlighted in previous studies. The extensive scope limitations and diversity of verification criteria employed by assurors indicate that mining companies had significant control over the practice. The Assurance Procedure might bring more consistency and breadth to the verification process. The extent to which it will contribute to increased trust in reported information will depend on several factors, including how assurors may interpret the procedure's requirements. Directions for further research are discussed. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley &amp; Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.