Safety & health

The websites below provides more information relating to the court application and settlement agreement:

• www.silicosissettlement.co.za
• www.oldcollab.co.za

Our approach to safety and the journey to achieve our goal of zero harm is an ongoing process. To achieve our goal, every employee and contractor must be empowered and enabled to act safely. For us, in an enabled environment, risk exposure is reduced by consistent, constant attention to maintaining a safe workplace with the required equipment, tools, and material that empower every person to deliver sustainable, safe production. That is why we are committed to ensuring that everyone working in our facilities has the appropriate resources, training and personal protective equipment to work safely. We also expect employees to take ownership of health and safety, comply with standards and procedures and immediately report any unhealthy or dangerous situation.  

As part of our journey to zero harm, we have created a Virtual Centre of Excellence in Innovative Mining Safe Production so that 19 tertiary institutions worldwide can share their specialist competencies, including mining-related safety and health, human factors, risk management, training modernisation, mining-related seismicity and sustainability concepts.

In 2018, we also formed a Global Safe Production Advisory Panel, comprising five leading globally recognized safety experts, to provide international insight and guidance based on best practices to drive continuous advancement in safe mining.

Our Zero Harm Strategic Framework, which was developed and implemented in 2018 in collaboration with organised labor and the Department of Mineral Resources in South Africa, emphasizes our CARES values as the basis for decision-making. Additionally, each of our regions has developed safety campaigns that align with its unique culture.

We strive to maintain the safety and health of our employees through the identification, prevention and reduction of exposure risks that can lead to occupational disease.

As with safety, each region has tailored its own needs-specific approach to health and wellness programs. In Southern Africa, we provide individualised care including access to occupational health resources that assess health risks and fitness to work, shaft clinics close the workplace, satellite primary healthcare clinics, 24/7 primary healthcare centers, emergency medical services, hospital networks offering specialized care, and medical aid that protects our employees from the financial risk of high medical costs.   

Our Road Map to Health, a proactive health model, has led to a decline in deaths, medical incapacitation rates and hospitalization. We have successfully reduced the impact of communicable diseases – specifically tuberculosis and HIV/AIDS – on our workforce in South Africa, including reducing the tuberculosis rate by 61 percent since 2012, and are expanding efforts to include a focus on mental health and non-communicable diseases. Our health care model has earned national and international recognition from the global Chief Medical Officers Network and the South African Department of Health.

We are also working to align our health care model with the UN Sustainable Development Goals 2015 to 2030, in particular, Goal 3, which relates to universal access to good health care and equity in health care.