Anglo American mines graded for responsible mining

The Mototolo and Amandelbult mines are the first platinum group metals mines in South Africa to complete an Initiative for Responsible Mining Assurance (IRMA) audit.

Mototolo and Amandelbult mines in South Africa achieved the IRMA 75 and IRMA 50 performance level respectively.

Anglo American Platinum are responsible for these mines that have been assessed against the IRMA’s mining standard for the first time.

The Unki mine in Zimbabwe, the first in the world to publicly commit to be independently audited against the IRMA Standard for Responsible Mining, already secured IRMA 75 in 2021, and this has been reconfirmed after a recent audit.

Therefore, three of Anglo American’s four mines are now IRMA accredited.

The IRMA scoring system recognises four levels of performance:

• IRMA Transparency, in which a mine is third-party assessed and publicly shares its scores
• IRMA 50, 75 or 100, which signifies a mine meets a core set of critical requirements, together with at least 50%, 75% or 100% of the requirements in each of the four sections of the Standard for Responsible Mining, respectively.

IRMA's Standard for Responsible Mining has been developed over a decade through a public consultation process with more than 100 different individuals and organisations, including mining companies, customers and the ultimate downstream users of mined products, NGOs, labour unions, and communities, and is considered one of the most rigorous certification processes.

Themba Mkhwanazi, Anglo American’s Regional Director – Africa and Australia, says, ‘Consumers are increasingly – and rightly – demanding assurance that the raw materials in their products are responsibly sourced. 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 on providing greater visibility of the origin and value chain of the future enabling metals and minerals they buy.’

Aimee Boulanger, Executive Director of IRMA, says, ‘Through detailed IRMA audit reports, mining companies, communities and companies that purchase mined materials can gain the information they need to decide what’s going well – and what may require more attention – at specific mines. The Mototolo, Amandelbult and Unki reports demonstrate that these mines can point to transparent, independent evaluations of their environmental and social performance.’