People, safety, health and sustainability
People
People are vital to the long-term sustainability, growth and profitability of the Company. Our people management strategy aims to create an environment conducive to achieving our business objectives by ensuring we have the right talent, in the right places to deliver the strategy.
Key metrics and related targets 2021
| People | ||
|---|---|---|
| Metrics | Targets, aims and performance | |
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Remuneration metrics (5.5% of DSP performance award): |
Related remuneration targets: | Performance |
| Strategic coverage of leadership roles | 15 to 18 designated (executive team) successors in place | 14 successors in place on average in 2021 |
| Key staff (skills) retention | 85% to 95% staff retention annually | Overall staff retention in 2021 was 95.58% |
| Gender diversity | 21% to 25% representation by women in Group workforce | Average Group representation by women of 15.24% in 2021 |
Other related metrics monitored:
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Other:
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See Talent and leadership development, Critical and scarce skills and Diversity and inclusion below as well as the <SR> Integrated talent management.
Organisation design and development
Operating model
A new operating model, designed and introduced to employees towards the end of 2021, aims to improve efficiency and support better operating outcomes by focusing only on work required to deliver the strategy, clarifying the mandates of corporate functions, properly resourcing our revenue-generating assets to deliver on their plans, and removing duplicate structures and activities.
A new organisational structure aligned with this model supports our people management strategy by: clearly defining the work critical to achieve the strategy; aggregating functional support roles in only two places in the organisation rather than three or four previously; clarifying accountabilities; improving the connections between all parts of the organisation; and ensuring the right skills are in place.
The model dictates that corporate functions are accountable for setting standards and minimum requirements in their areas, while the new Business Units will have the resources and decisionmaking flexibility to deliver the best operational outcomes, within the requirements set out in the policies and standards created by corporate. Specialist capability also exists at the corporate centre to deliver support as required.
In line with the new model, the human resources team will focus on enhancing the quality of our leadership cohort, meeting requirements for improved talent and skills, embedding bespoke human resources planning and labour strategies, and using data analytics to improve people management decisions.
Learning and development
Learning and development programmes are critical for enhancing employee performance, developing critical skills and ensuring leaders provide an empowering work environment. Development blends experience, exposure and education interventions to build breadth and depth of critical experience and leadership capabilities.
On-line/virtual learning
The COVID-19 pandemic accelerated the shift from traditional classroom to online and virtual learning. The EdCast Learning Platform went live in January 2022 and is a cost-effective, artificial intelligence-based learning platform that is flexible in terms of when and where it can be used. It provides learning tailored to individual development needs and is aligned with our leadership competency framework, providing technical training to support our health of discipline objectives.
This project is a collaborative effort supported by business units and disciplines heads. Learning modules, using both external and internal learning material where relevant, include future skills, leadership development, project management, engineering skills development as well as some key learning pathways such as women in leadership, major hazards and critical controls.
The pilot initiative, with 400 participants across the business, runs until March 2022 and will be followed by an assessment of its effectiveness and impact before a broader rollout.
Talent and leadership development
A successful learning and development strategy enables better professional development and is key to maintaining a healthy talent pipeline. Development interventions are informed by structured career engagements and have clear time frames linked to defined development needs.
In 2021, we introduced development assessments for successors to key roles to better understand their potential, strengths, current development areas and aspirations. These assessments were implemented for all near-term Executive Committee successors and will be cascaded to lower levels during 2022. We engaged with tertiary institutions to understand how they may support our talent development objectives. A managerial leadership development strategy to support our Managerial Leadership Development Competency Framework is being finalised. A neuro-leadership development programme piloted at our Africa operations consists of on-line learning and coaching. The programme was well received and provided valuable insights.
- Young leader development
The Emerging Young Leader Development Programme aims to enhance our long-term leadership pipeline with inductees assigned to high-impact projects in the business. Participants receive mentoring and coaching from in-house experts and since its inception in 2015, 40 young leaders – 54% women – from various disciplines have graduated from the programme. About two-thirds are from core disciplines. The graduates return to roles within their business areas and receive mentorship and opportunities to participate in international programmes, for secondments and further studies. Thus far, 96% have been promoted or changed roles and 82% have been retained in the Company.
The programme was redesigned during 2021 to sharpen its focus on adding value to strategic projects and improving each participant’s management capabilities. - AngloGold Ashanti Mentorship Programme
The programme was redesigned during 2021 to sharpen its focus on adding value to strategic projects and improving each participant’s management capabilities.
Talent management
Effective talent management is vital to business sustainability and competitiveness. A comprehensive talent and succession planning guideline was developed and socialised during 2021. The guideline includes standards and toolkits to equip line management to make effective talent and succession decisions.
We reintroduced the concept of ‘Levels’ during the year to aid determination of successor potential and readiness levels. A comprehensive assessment programme was developed for all Executive Committee successors. Around 60% of the 33 identified executive successors had been assessed by year end and most had participated in discussions with their manager-once-removed to facilitate development and readiness. There is a healthy succession coverage of 6.2 successors per role for all stratum IV and above roles, with a favourable age distribution.
Critical and scarce skills
Increased demand for key skills, the pandemic’s restrictions on skills mobility, localisation imperatives and diminished desirability of a career in mining for many young graduates, have necessitated initiatives to strengthen the pipeline for critical and scarce skills.
The 2021 talent and succession review incorporated a Critical Role Identification Framework to consider the impact of roles on the business and the risk of their being vacant for extended periods. The review enabled line managers and Business Units to be more specific and objective in identifying critical roles.
Our ability to assess the strength of internal and external skills pipelines, to address gaps within these pipelines, and to focus on recruitment initiatives to fill vacancies have been enhanced by:
- Intensifying internal training and development to secure a critical scarce skills pipeline
- Establishing strategic partnerships with recruitment agencies and educational institutions
- Focusing graduate development and internship programmes on specific skills
- Applying remuneration benchmarks for critical/scarce skills and subsequent use of appropriate remuneration, benefits, and retention initiatives
- Incorporating critical and scarce skills into competency and assessment frameworks of Health of Discipline (HOD) assessments
See Rewarding delivery for detail on our remuneration philosophy, policy and related implementation.
Employee relations
Our workforce is highly unionized, requiring a structured approach to employee relations, based on engaging with employees and their representative unions in a manner that improves relations and establishes trust. Our interest-based approach to collective bargaining and compliance with labour legislation, as well as fair and transparent policies and procedures, underpins constructive relations with our employees and unions. In Australia and United States, where no unions are present on our operations, we rely on management practices that promote healthy employees relations.
None of our operations experienced any strike action during 2021. Wage negotiations were concluded at Obuasi, Geita and Siguiri, testament to an effective approach to collective bargaining.
Diversity and inclusion
Diversity and inclusion are business imperatives and we celebrate differences in race, gender, culture, sexual orientation and ability. Diversity and inclusion are embedded as a line management accountability, measured through our key performance indicator (KPI) management systems, and overseen by a clear governance structure that breathes life into our values and commitment to human rights and non-discrimination.
During the year we conducted unconscious bias training, established diversity and inclusion committees, developed site-based diversity and inclusion policies, implemented nondiscriminatory and competitive remuneration scale and practices for all employees, ensured gender-balanced intake for graduate trainees and national service programmes, and reinforced our value to create a diverse workforce through refresher training.
Localisation
We are committed to prioritising employment of local nationals and to reducing the number of expatriate workers where we operate. We do so responsibly, without impacting our operational requirements and working closely with regulators. Site action plans identify gaps and career paths for talented individuals. Initiatives were undertaken to create roles for promising talent and additional positions were created for graduates and learners. To bring impetus to skills transfer to local nationals, special recognition initiatives were implemented, together with coaching and mentoring. To promote retention, dedicated site diversity programmes and action plans were adopted. Accountability for localisation rests with site leadership, who provide regular detailed reports to the Executive Committee and the Remuneration and Human Resources Committee.
Employee engagement
Global engagement surveys
Regular employee engagement surveys help to build high performing employees and teams, united in achieving the best outcomes. The recent employee engagement demonstrated that, despite the impact of COVID-19 and remote work, engagement remained at satisfactory levels.
Cultural assessment survey
People are at the centre of what we do, and we are driven by our values and the diversity, talents and aspirations of the people in the business. We are determined to create an inclusive and collaborative environment based on trust, respect and dignity. During October 2021, we conducted a culture assessment survey, which received an 80% participation rate.
Key insights from the survey were:
- Most employees have a grounded and well-rounded set of values
- There is a satisfactory match between the current and desired culture
- Employees are committed to safety and health, continuous improvement, accountability, and continuous learning
- While employees have experienced significant transformation and change, they are willing to continue changing and growing
- There is a willingness to embrace a culture characterised by greater employee engagement, recognition, leadership, professional growth and open communication
- Employees desire greater accountability
Culture often reflects the values, beliefs, and behaviours of leadership and so executive leadership feedback sessions were conducted as part of a culture transformation implementation plan.
SAFETY AND HEALTH
The safety and health of our employees and host communities is paramount and, with the goal of achieving zero harm across our operations, we continue to design and implement strategies to eliminate high potential incidents, fatalities and catastrophic events.
Key metrics and related targets 2021
| Health and safety | ||
|---|---|---|
| Metrics | Targets, aims and performance | |
|
Remuneration metrics: (11% of DSP performance award) |
Related remuneration targets: | Performance |
| All injury frequency rate (AIFR) | Continually improve AIFR performance | Group AIFR increased from 1.68 to 2.14 per million hours worked (excluding the former South African assets) |
| Major hazard management critical control percentage compliance | 95% to 99.5% critical control compliance | The level of critical control compliance achieved in 2021 was 99.15% |
| Cumulative number of site-specific critical control registers established for major health risks | Five to eight cumulative number of site-specific critical control registers established for major health risks | At year end, there were an average of seven control registers for site-specific major health risks critical controls in place at each of our mining operations, with 83 registers completed. This compares to a target of six per site, and a stretch target of eight |
| Compliance with operational occupational exposure (noise and dust) monitoring programmes | 60% to 90% compliance with operational occupational exposure (noise and dust) monitoring programmes | All operations continued to strengthen their occupational hygiene monitoring programmes to ensure adequate and effective measurement of workplace health hazards |
Other related metrics monitored:
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Overall safety and health aims are:
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See below as well as the for <SR> further detail on our safety performance.
Revitalised safety strategy
In 2021, we introduced a three-year work plan to revitalise our safety strategy. The plan centres on four areas: leadership and people, work processes, technology and innovation, and risk management. We developed a safety induction programme for all leaders and now have clearer lines of accountability with further work planned to align accountabilities of line management and safety support staff, to the new operating model.
The introduction of a new Integrated Sustainability Information Management System (iSIMS) means we can more effectively integrate operational risk management and key performance indicators at all levels of the organisation.
Technology is aiding our drive to achieve our safety targets and we have a Centre of Excellence portal to share safety updates and lessons. We are simplifying our major hazard control standards and our critical monitoring programme to ensure verification and checks are well understood, allowing them to be effectively implemented. Employees and contractors are educated on the critical risks linked to their roles and can apply controls to manage these risks.
Improving injury frequency rates
Over several years, our all injury frequency rate is improving and now stands at a rate of 2.14 per million hours worked. This is lower than the latest ICMM member company average for 2020 of 2.94 per million hours worked.
In the year, we tragically lost two of our colleagues and we extend our heartfelt condolences to their friends and families.
Carlos Machado Barbosa, 43 years old, lost his life in a tragic accident at Serra Grande in Brazil. Carlos was a blaster at the mine and was fatally injured during a fall-of-ground incident in an underground stope on 16 February 2021. Daniel Nuertey-Kwao Quaynortey, 46 years old, was an employee of contractor African Underground Mining Alliance who died in a sill-pillar failure at the Obuasi mine on Tuesday, 18 May 2021. His body was discovered on Saturday, 29 May 2021 by mine rescue teams.
Safety compliance: All operations except for Obuasi have successfully migrated to ISO 45001:2018, which has replaced the OHSAS 18001:2007 series. Obuasi is scheduled to migrate in 2022..
Management led
Our executives and line managers are responsible for integrating safety into the business and we are intensifying employees’ focus on safety practices in all workplaces. Risk management and critical control modelling resulted in continued efforts to strengthen safety protocols and preventative measures. Implementation of our safety strategy is overseen by our Social, Ethics and Sustainability Committee.
Employee health and well-being
In working towards achieving our health metrics, we conduct systematic assessments and mitigation programmes for occupational and community health risks and impacts of our mining operations on our communities. These are completed through baseline occupational hygiene assessments, as well as community health baselines and impact assessments.
In line with our health and well-being strategy, which includes strengthening governance and assurance systems and processes to avert long- and short-term risks and impacts, we adopted a suite of updated health standards based on the systematically identified major health risks or hazards. These standards are important to the introduction of critical control principles to manage health risk, where applicable. The new suite of Health Standards has been approved by the Sustainability Policy and Standards Committee and are in use across all sites. The standards will be published once a company-wide plan to standardise Company documents, is complete. For now, we continue to refer to the Health & Safety Standards online.
The Health and Safety section of our Risk Management Guideline and Risk Matrix was reviewed and updated to integrate health and hygiene consequence definitions and classification metrics into the initially safety-heavy approach to risk consequence classification. In 2021, we recorded six occupational diseases cases – one at Cerro Vanguardia, two at AGA Mineração, two at Geita, and one at Obuasi. Of the six cases, five were related to noise-induced hearing loss (NIHL) and one to temporary heat-related stress. This resulted in an all occupational disease frequency rate (AODFR) of 0.08 cases per million hours worked in 2021. This rate remains low and less than one case per million hours worked, an improvement to the long-term trend following the Company’s sale of its South African portfolio, which had traditionally accounted for the greatest burden of occupational medical diseases across the Group.
Health in the community
It is clear that as we work to end occupational disease and associated health risk across our operations, we cannot view our sites in isolation. Increasingly, we are working to improve available healthcare. COVID-19 brought into sharp focus the symbiotic relationship between community and employee health. As with many diseases, the pandemic does not stop at the mine fence.
Over the past two years, measures to educate on, and stop the spread of the pandemic have been embedded throughout our operations. We have also worked in the communities to educate and provide medical supplies, in line with government protocols.
Where we have been able, we have promoted the rollout of the vaccine. By the end of 2021, we believe approximately 85% of the workforce was fully vaccinated, excluding booster shots.
We are also aware of the pressures caused by the pandemic and its impact on employee mental health and, with that, the potential impact on safety. See <SR> and related Healthy Minds case study.
Public health initiatives
We continued to collaborate closely with our sustainability colleagues at sites to support community-based health initiatives and projects outside of our COVID-19 work. African operations focused on chronic disease and cancer screening outreach and malaria programmes.
SUSTAINABILITY – ENVIRONMENT AND COMMUNITY
We work to achieve our sustainability goals by reducing our environmental impact, supporting community projects in business development, education and infrastructure and by ensuring we plan well and work efficiently and cost effectively. We proactively manage risks to air, land, biodiversity and water during the mining lifecycle.
Crucial to our ability to maintain our social licence to mine is engaging with, and listening to, the people in the communities in which we work and all our other stakeholders, in both national and local government and throughout civil society. The table below presents our related key metrics, targets and performance for the environment and communities.
Key metrics and related targets 2021
| Environment | ||
|---|---|---|
| Metrics | Targets, aims and performance | |
|
Remuneration metrics (6% of DSP performance award): |
Related remuneration targets: | Performance |
| Number of reportable environmental incidents | No more than two reportable environmental incidents annually | Number of reportable environmental incidents declined to five compared to eight in 2020 |
| GHG emissions intensity – develop a carbon budget for each operation | 80% to 100% of operations | Individual carbon budgets were developed for all operations, based on their respective life-of-mine plans |
Other environmental metrics monitored:
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Related environmental aims:
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See below, Three-year statistics and <SR> for more detail on our environmental performance in 2021. |
| Communities | ||
| Remuneration metrics (2.5% of DSP performance award): |
Related remuneration targets: | Performance: |
| No. of business disruptions resulting from community unrest | Three significant community-related business disruptions at most annually | There was one significant community business disruption resulting from community unrest at Siguiri in Guinea |
Other community metrics monitored:
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Related aims:
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No human rights violations were recorded in 2021. We released our Human Rights Report in 2021. |
See below and the <SR> for more detail on our community-related and socio-economic performance in 2021.
Management of the environment
Senior operational managers are responsible for ensuring operations comply with their respective regulatory and permit requirements, as well as our Environmental Management Standards. Day-to-day management is enabled by site-level Environment Management Systems which are externally certified to the ISO 14001:2015 Standard.
Environmental compliance: All sites are certified except Obuasi whose certification was deliberately allowed to lapse while operations were suspended. Work for Obuasi’s re-certification in 2022 is currently underway.
Managing our climate change impacts
Our Climate Change Strategy, approved by the board in November 2021, seeks to embed management of physical risks, transition climate risks and climate opportunities into our strategic and operational planning processes. Our climate work is further underpinned by a framework that aims to improve our climate maturity along four pillars, aligned with the TCFD themes of governance, strategy, risk management and climate metrics and targets.
In December 2021, we published our inaugural Climate Change Report, in line with TCFD recommendations. It highlights the ways in which we are being proactive and transparent in mitigating current and future climate risks and the measures being taking to strengthen the climate resilience of our business, our value chain partners, host communities and the environment in which we operate. See <CCR>.
We also joined our peers in the ICMM by committing to a target of net zero Scope 1 and 2 GHG emissions by 2050, and in partnership with our value chain partners, to set Scope 3 GHG reduction targets, if not by the end of 2023, as soon as possible thereafter.
Managing and conserving water
Our water management standard mandates comprehensive understanding of water risks and the implementation of tailored management and monitoring plans, supported by context-specific objectives and targets.
Core objectives for operational water management are to minimise new water withdrawals and maximise reuse of water to the extent possible and to prevent contamination of water resources through our activities. This is achieved by either maintaining zero-water discharge on sites, or by treating and releasing excess water from the process circuit, typically the case for high rainfall sites.
During the year, the Iduapriem mine’s water treatment facility was expanded to accommodate the release of greater water volumes from the process water inventory during construction and ramp up of a planned new tailings facility. Rehabilitation of Iduapriem’s Block 1 waste rock facility, which required active treatment of low pH seepage water, was reworked to encapsulate acid generate rock more effectively, and to reduce rainfall infiltration.
A site-wide water optimisation project started at Tropicana is aimed at reducing water abstraction from aquifers and using water by preference, namely water from higher efficiency bores requiring less energy consumption and providing higher water yields, including those around the TSF. Variable-speed pumps with reduced energy usage, operating off the mine’s internal electricity supply grid, have been introduced, eliminating the need for standalone diesel generators, which further aids in reducing greenhouse gas emissions. The project increased the site’s recycled water use, and cut diesel consumption for borefield pumping by up to 35%.
Managing our tailings
AngloGold Ashanti has committed to implement, the Global Industry Standard on Tailings Management (GISTM) at all TSFs by August 2025.
While we have conducted external TSF reviews in Brazil, we have not yet set up Independent Tailings Review Boards (ITRBs) for our South American operations. We have established ITRBs for our African and Australian operations, and have reviewed the TSFs at Obuasi, Iduapriem, Geita, Tropicana and Sunrise Dam.
Integrated closure management
Our integrated closure management standard aims to ensure that our activities minimise adverse impacts on people, the environment and broader society. Our Closure Planning Standard Geita sets a consistent benchmark across all operations and ensures a multi-disciplinary approach to identifying and managing current and future closure risks and liabilities, while identifying opportunities for value-adding initiatives and projects.
We review and update our mine closure liability estimates quarterly to comply with legislative changes and align with business and closure plans, among others. At year-end, the consolidated group environmental liability estimate totalled $688m, which includes an onerous obligation provision of $15m for Yatela (2020: $674m). We put in place financial instruments to ensure that resources are available to meet our closure obligations.
The social aspects of mine closure are critically important. There is a growing emphasis on contributing to resilient and sustainable communities during the lifecycle of the mining operation in order to ensure a positive legacy after closure.
See Environmental stewardship, Ensuring integrated closure and Resilient, self-sustaining communities in the <SR>.
Contributing to resilient, self-sustaining communities
AngloGold Ashanti’s foundation in community relations is built on mutual respect, transparency and trust. Our activities are guided by our Social Performance management framework that includes the Community Relations Policy and its supplementary management standards and guidelines, which are found in AngloGold Ashanti’s Code of Business Principles and Ethics, Our Code.
All sites have stakeholder engagement plans, based on detailed annual stakeholder mapping processes. These plans are guided by our Stakeholder Engagement Management Standard, which is aligned with the International Finance Corporation’s (IFC) Performance Standard 2. For more information, see <SR>.
Mitigating current and legacy impacts
We understand that our activities can have negative impacts on communities that must be addressed fairly and openly. Grievances are addressed using Group management principles taken from the Performance Standards of the IFC and the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights.
Our social impact management approach dictates that our operations must identify and mitigate past, current and future impacts. This considers external factors such as changing sociopolitical and economic content and societal expectations and community concerns. All AngloGold Ashanti sites are expected to avoid or, where not possible, minimise their impacts on local communities through project design and management plans. Grievance mechanisms are critical to this process and we have in place a series of mechanisms to address community complaints. For more detail, see <SR>.
Socio-economic contributions
A key focus is our contribution to the development of local and host communities. We continued to engage with stakeholders on the implementation of our socio-economic development plans, guided by the Socio-Economic Contribution Standard, and invested $18.1m (excluding joint ventures) in community investment projects in the areas of education, social infrastructure, income generation initiatives and health in 2021 (2020: $20.6m, including South African operations and excluding joint ventures).
Inclusive employment and procurement
AngloGold Ashanti makes every effort to procure goods and services from local business and has held various briefing sessions to guide potential suppliers on how to participate in the supply chain. See <SR>.
The employment of local people wherever possible is aligned with our localisation strategy and is vital in ensuring tangible value is shared with our host countries and communities.
Rights of indigenous people
Our policy is in line with international standards and treaties in the area of Indigenous Peoples’ rights. We align with the ICMM Position Statement on Indigenous Peoples and the IFC’s Performance Standard 7 on Indigenous Peoples. Understanding and respect for the values, traditions, and cultures of the local and indigenous communities in which we operate is ingrained in our values. See <SR>.
Respecting and upholding human rights
AngloGold Ashanti has a responsibility to respect human rights and, where practically possible, to leverage its position and influence to ensure that state actors protect human rights.
We have a human rights governance framework and a human rights policy in place. We are committed to the United Nations Guiding Principles and other international initiatives such as the UN Global Compact and we are a member of the Voluntary Principles on Security and Human Rights (VPSHR). See <SR>.
The starting point for AngloGold Ashanti’s human rights work is the risk management process. Cutting across disciplines and the entire project lifecycle, the human rights risk assessment process forms part of the Group enterprise risk management system. The human rights due diligence process forms a critical part of this system. Training and communication help ensure that AngloGold Ashanti employees, contractors and suppliers, communities and governments understand what human rights are, what they mean in the context of mining and what their responsibilities are in this regard. Awareness-raising is critical, and every employee should be able to act as an advocate and ambassador for human rights. We recorded no human rights violations in 2021.
Artisanal and small-scale mining
Artisanal and small-scale mining (ASM) operations, where individuals and a growing number of organised groups mine informally and sometimes illegally, either on previously mined areas or in some cases on sites belonging to AngloGold Ashanti, are a material concern to the Company. We continue to advocate for increased efforts in the formalisation of ASM, helping to educate and provide safer work environments and alternative avenues for the people around our mines to secure a living.
At Siguiri, in Guinea, illegal mining activities in our concessions continue. We work with local and regional authorities, community leaders and other stakeholders to assist in mitigating or reducing this risk to communities and our operations. We also facilitated a process for the initiation of an ASM formalisation project here in 2020, by introducing a third party ASM expert, who is co-ordinating the project led by the Guinea Government, with our full support. Unfortunately, as a result of COVID-19 and changes in Guinea’s government, the project launch has been delayed. We are hopeful that it will take place in 2022 and stand ready to support it.
