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(Alliance News) - Anglo American PLC on Wednesday said the Minas-Rio iron ore and Barro Alto nickel mines have been given a positive audit by the Initiative for Responsible Mining Assurance's mining standard.
The London-based diversified miner said Minas-Rio and Barro Alto are the first iron ore and nickel-producing mines in the world to complete an IRMA audit.
They were both awarded the IRMA 75 level of performance, which Anglo American said reflected its "integrated approach to sustainability and its commitment to transparency in striving for the highest levels of responsible metals production."
Anglo American said this follows its Unki platinum mine in Zimbabwe being the first in the world to publicly commit to be independently audited by IRMA. It also achived IRMA 75 in 2021.
"We believe our participation in IRMA helps promote transparency and best practice in sustainability, while adding value to our customers by helping them to meet increasing expectations for responsibly sourced mined materials in an efficient and credible way," said Anglo American Americas Regional Director Ruben Fernandes.
"We are continuing to make great progress towards assuring all our operations against a recognised responsible mining standard by 2025, as we committed to in our sustainable mining plan."
Anglo American Brazil Chief Executive Officer Ana Sanches commented: "The IRMA assurance process has provided us with a valuable opportunity to measure our performance at Minas-Rio and Barro Alto against international best sustainability practices and identify next steps for improvement. The result is informed by evidence from a diverse range of stakeholders including employees, governments, [non-governmental organisations], customers and communities alike."
Other Anglo American operations that have been independently audited include the Mototolo, Amandelbult and Mogalakwena platinum group metals operations in South Africa. This is alongside the Kolomela and Sishen iron ore operations, which are also in South Africa. The outcomes of those audit reports are pending, Anglo American said.
It explained the IRMA scoring system as recognising four levels of performance: IRMA Transparency, in which a mine is third-party-assessed and publicly shares its scores; IRMA 50 or 75, which demonstrates that a mine has met a "core set of critical requirements together with at least 50% or 75% of the requirements in each of the four sections of the standard for responsible mining"; and IRMA 100, which signifies the mine meets all of the standard's requirements.
Shares in Anglo American were down 0.2% to 1,818.60 pence each in London early Wednesday. In Johannesburg, it was down 0.9% to ZAR431.83 each.
By Greg Rosenvinge, Alliance News senior reporter
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