Benchmarking Safety Data: Progress of ICMM Company Members (2014)

Each year ICMM releases safety data on the performance of our members as we seek to eliminate fatalities and catastrophic events. Every fatality is one too many and we are working hard to achieve our goal of zero fatalities.

ICMM member companies commit to continuous improvement as expressed through ICMM Principle 5 – Seek continual improvement of our health and safety performance – and report safety data externally through annual sustainability reports. This data however, often has subtle differences due to government reporting requirements, reporting periods and differences in the criteria through which injuries are classified. As a result, we have developed a common approach for ICMM member companies to share their information.

Data is reported using the Health and Safety Performance Indicators definitions ICMM published in 2014. While all effort is made to ensure the data complies with the definitions, it should be noted that some minor differences still exist between companies. Acknowledging this, we are continuously looking at ways to improve the consistency of data.

2012–2014 Data

Table 1 shows key safety performance data of 21 ICMM member companies between 2012 and 2014. (Table 2 provides a full breakdown for members in 2014).

Table 1: Summary of safety performance data, 2012–2014

* Rates are per 1 million hours worked (calculated by dividing the total number of fatalities or TRIs by the hours worked at the companies, and then multiplied by 1 million).
** In 2013 at the Freeport-McMoRan Grasberg operation in Indonesia, there were 28 deaths and 10 people were injured in a tragic accident at an underground training facility, an event unprecedented in over 40 years.

Data includes Antofagasta Minerals and Glencore who became ICMM members in 2014. New members South32 and Polyus Gold joined ICMM in 2015 and will be included in next year’s report.

Graph 1 shows the total number of fatalities and the equivelent fatality rate from ICMM members companies between 2012 – 2014.

The 2012 – 2014 data tells us:

• The number of fatalities reported has fallen by 38% between 2013 and 2014.
• The number of injuries recorded in 2012 dropped by 16% in 2013 and saw a subsequent drop of 10% in 2014 (a 25% decrease over the whole period).

2014 Fatalities and Recordable Injuries

Below are two graphs that show a more detailed analysis of the data for calendar year 2014 (i.e. as opposed to financial year calculations, the reporting periods of which differ from company to company). The total number of fatalities per company can be seen in table 2 at the end of this report.

Graph 2 shows the fatality frequency rate of each member company in 2014 and graph 3 shows the total recordable injury (TRI) case rate of each member company in 2014 per 1 million hours worked. The fatality frequency rate and TRI case rate is calculated by first dividing the number of fatalities or TRI’s by the total number of hours worked at the company, and then multiplying by 1 million to provide an equivalent rate across the companies.

The rates represent the number of fatalities or injuries against the number of hours worked in a company. This helps to provide a like for like comparison between the companies, taking into account anomalies that may have occurred in the year. For example, there was a six month strike in the South African platinum industry at the start of 2014 which may have had an impact of reducing the number of fatalities and injuries experienced by those producers. The calculation of a rate helps to overcome this as the number of hours worked would also have been reduced.

Working Towards Zero Fatalities

While ICMM members have achieved a reduction in fatalities, the industry must continue its pursuit of eliminating them altogether. Over the past couple of year members have been focused on addressing critical risks. ICMM believes that one approach – critical control management – is key to helping the industry achieve this goal.

Critical control management is founded on the principle that not all controls are crucial, by systematically identifying, assessing, implementing and evaluating those that can prevent unwanted events, can prevent fatalities or catastrophic events.

While the critical control management process is well established and in use in many high-hazard industries, in April 2015 ICMM released the first guide specifically tailored for the mining and metals industry titled Critical Control Management Guide: Good Practice Guide. The guide presents nine steps: ranging from step 1 which helps develop the scope of critical control management implementation, through to step 9 which offers guidance on appropriate response and action to be taken when critical controls are underperforming, leading to an incident.

In support of this guide, ICMM is also releasing additional implementation guidance for critical control management. It includes a summary of the process, references the challenges and provides advice, suggestions and a step by step guide that uses health and safety case studies to demonstrate the approach.

Table 2: All Data for ICMM Company Members in 2014

* Rates are per 1 million hours worked (calculated by dividing the total number of fatalities or TRIs by the hours worked at the companies, and then multiplied by 1 million).

Notes

1. Value amended in July 2016. ICMM originally reported 55 fatalities in 2014, which has been amended to 56. The increase came from a correction in the number of fatalities reported by Gold Fields.

2. Anglo American’s Total recordable case frequency rate (TRCFR) includes fatal injuries, lost-time injuries and medical treatment cases, However, In some parts of the business, first aid cases are also included. Anglo American’s historical TRCFR may therefore not be directly comparable to peers, although this discrepancy will be remedied from 2016 onwards.

3. AREVA have differences regarding the classifications of our No Loss Tim e Injuries (NLTI - medical aids and first aids). AREVA group classifies its events regarding the location of the treatment. If the injured person has to go for treatment outside the sites - and come back to work the day after, it is considered as medical aid. If the treatment occurs at the first aid station on site (no matter what the treatment is) and the injured person goes back to work immediately after, it is considered as a first aid.

4. BHP Billiton data fully complies with the ICMM recording boundaries. BHP Billiton use Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) definitions for Injuries and Disease classification which differs slightly from ICMM definitions. The figures also include health and safety data from the BHP Billiton Petroleum business.

5. Glencore statistics includes data from their Oil and Agriculture Departments.

6. The domestic data (in Japan) includes both of employee and contractors. The foreign data (other countries) refers to employees only.

7. Teck Medical Aid Definition: The use of prescription medication alone for any treatment other than eye injury is not a reportable medical treatment. Use of prescription medication for eye injuries is a reportable medical treatment. Medical treatment also includes the application of a cast or other professional means of immobilizing an injured part of the body.