CSR policy for miners soon

The Minerals Commission says it will soon launch a national policy on corporate social responsibility in the mining sector, its Chief Executive Officer Mr. Benjamin Ayree has disclosed.

The policy will define the parameters within which the mining and other corporate entities will operate to improve the livelihoods of people within their catchment areas.

The Minerals Commission is the lead institution developing the framework which is aimed at defining parameters for mining companies on guidelines to carry out corporate social responsibility programmes in the country.

Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) strategies and practices can enable the mining industry to increase its impact on poverty alleviation and development in the country, in a cost-effective and practical manner.

Mr. Benjamin Aryee, Chief Executive Officer, Minerals Commission, disclosed to B&FT in Accra that the guidelines when fully adopted will standardise the corporate social responsibility programmes of the sector, and in the future will be formally legislated.

“CSR is largely voluntary all over the world including Ghana; although it is not legislated, coming out with guidelines to direct mining companies on their social responsibility programmes.

“This will make mining companies operating in the country more responsible to the society, as well as contribute immensely to the socio-economic development of the country,” Mr. Aryee said.

In recent years, concerns about the sustainability and social responsibility of businesses have become an increasingly high profile issue in many countries and industries, including Ghana, and more so in the mining industry.

For mining, one outcome of the CSR agenda is the increasing need for individual companies to justify their existence and document their performance through the disclosure of social and environmental information.

The country’s minerals sector has been estimated to hold vast untapped potential, with the value increasing from US$0.64billion in 2009 to US$1.68billion in 2014.