Governance and accountability
Our President and CEO is ultimately responsible for environmental management with our Group Sustainability Executive taking the lead in driving the implementation of our environmental policies, the associated procedures and overall performance — including biodiversity.
The Group Sustainability Executive is supported by our Group Sustainability Manager, regional-level environmental leads as well as dedicated site-level environmental teams and at priority sites biodiversity specialists who drive implementation at the operational level.
Policies and procedures
Our approach to biodiversity is codified in our Environment Policy and our standalone Biodiversity Policy and augmented by our group Biodiversity Standard.
These are informed by international best practice, such as the guidelines set by the International Finance Corporation’s (IFC) performance Standards (PS), International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) and International Council on Mining and Metals, including their Mining and Protected Areas position statement.
Our policies commit us to:
- A net neutral impact on any Key Biodiversity Features (KBFs) identified at our sites, and
- A positive contribution to the conservation of high value biodiversity in the regions in which we operate, through the implementation of Measurable Conservation Actions (MCAs).
To fulfil these commitments, we require all our operational sites to develop and implement Biodiversity Action Plans (BAPs). These detail the flora, fauna and habitats on and around the site and outline the strategy we will follow to achieve a net neutral biodiversity impact. They identify areas around the mine that require protection or could benefit from conservation support, as well as existing conservation areas that require additional support and resources.
To achieve these commitments we are developing a roadmap of actions we plan to take now and in the future. This includes the development of our own tool to measure biodiversity or nature impact.
BAPs are the cornerstone of our approach to biodiversity management. They document the biodiversity in, or impacted by an operational site, and the actions to be taken to minimize risks and maximize opportunities. We have aligned our approach to BAPs with that of the IFC Performance Standard 6 (PS6), which stipulates that a BAP should address the following:
- The actions and rationale for how a project’s mitigation strategy will achieve net gain or no net loss of biodiversity;
- The project’s approach to implementing the mitigation hierarchy; and
- The roles and responsibilities for internal staff and external partners.
Our BAPs are developed as strategy documents for the achievement of operational biodiversity goals. In keeping with our Biodiversity Policy, the goals are to achieve net neutral biodiversity impact for any ecologically sensitive environment we affect, where practicably possible.
Our understanding of the mitigation hierarchy and our approach to its implementation are set out in our BAPs and the roles and responsibilities for all key players are clearly defined.
BAPs also refer to the operational biodiversity mitigation measures included in the project EMS or biodiversity management plans (BMP).
In line with the IFC PS6 approach, our BAPs differ from BMPs and also include actions for off-site areas (e.g., offsets, additional actions) and involve external partners (e.g., implementing partners, reviewers or advisors). Designed to function as living documents, our BAPs are reviewed on an annual basis and revised every two years. As part of our approach to biodiversity, we emphasize concurrent reclamation and work to keep the overall footprint of our mines to a minimum. We work to restore and rehabilitate areas of the operation during its mine life by returning topsoil as well as planting native and endemic vegetation.