Independent assurance statement to the Board of Directors and stakeholders of Gold Fields Limited
ERM Southern Africa (Pty) Ltd (ERM) was engaged by Gold Fields to provide assurance in relation to selected sustainability information set out below and presented in Gold Fields' 2017 Integrated Annual Report for the year ended 31 December 2017 ('the Report').
| Engagement summary | |
| Engagement scope (subject matters): |
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| Reporting criteria: | For environmental, health and safety and social KPIs:
For Mining Charter related KPIs:
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| Assurance standard used: | ERM CVS' assurance methodology, based on the International Standard on Assurance Engagements ISAE 3000 (Revised) and ISAE 3410 (for GHG Statements) |
| Assurance level: | Reasonable assurance for all Subject Matters |
| Respective responsibilities: | Gold Fields is responsible for preparing the Report, including the collection and presentation of the selected sustainability information within it, the design, implementation and maintenance of related internal controls, and for the integrity of its website. ERM's responsibility is to provide an opinion on the selected information based on the evidence we have obtained and exercising our professional judgement. |
Our assurance activities
We planned and performed our work to obtain all the information and explanations that we believe were necessary to reduce the risk of material misstatement to low and therefore provide a basis for our assurance opinion. A multi-disciplinary team of sustainability and assurance specialists performed the assurance activities, including:
- A review of external media reporting relating to Gold Fields, peer company annual reports and industry standards to identify relevant sustainability issues in the reporting period.
- Interviews with relevant corporate level staff to understand Gold Fields' sustainability strategy, policies and management systems, including stakeholder engagement and materiality assessment.
- Interviews with a selection of staff and management, including senior executives, to gain an understanding of:
- The status of implementation of the ICMM sustainable development Principles in Gold Fields' strategy and policies;
- Gold Fields' identification and management of sustainable development risks and opportunities as determined through its review of the business and the views and expectations of its stakeholders.
- Observation of an external stakeholder engagement meeting on material issues facing the business.
- Reviewing policies and procedures and assessing alignment with ICMM's 10 Sustainable Development Principles and other mandatory requirements set out in the ICMM's Position Statements in effect as at 31 December 2017.
- Testing the processes and systems, including internal controls, used to generate, consolidate and report the selected sustainability information.
- A review of the suitability of the internal reporting guidelines, including conversion factors used.
- Physical visits to verify source data and other evidence at the following sites:
- South Deep, South Africa
- Tarkwa, Ghana
- Damang, Ghana
- Cerro Corona, Peru
- Agnew, Australia (verification visit)
- Virtual reviews to verify source data for the following sites:
- Agnew, Australia
- Granny Smith, Australia
- St Ives, Australia
- An analytical review of the year-end data submitted by the sites listed above, and testing of the accuracy and completeness of the consolidated 2017 Group data for the selected KPIs.
- A review of the presentation of information relevant to the scope of our work in the Report to ensure consistency with our findings.
Our assurance opinion
In our opinion:
- The selected sustainability performance information set out in Tables 1 and 2 for the year ended 31 December 2017 is prepared, in all material respects, in accordance with the Gold Fields reporting criteria; and
- The Directors' statement in the "About this Report" section of the Report that Gold Fields has complied with the ICMM Sustainable Development Framework, Principles, Position Statements and reporting requirements is, in all material respects, fairly stated.
Our observations
We have provided Gold Fields with a separate detailed management report. Without affecting the opinions presented above, we have the following key observation:
- Due to weaknesses in documentation and in the control environment relating to safety performance data at the South Deep and Tarkwa operations, we undertook additional procedures to verify the categorisation of safety incidents at these sites. We recommend giving urgent attention to addressing these deficiencies in order to reduce the risk of material misstatement in this subject matter as well as audit effort.
The limitations of our engagement
The reliability of the assured data is subject to inherent uncertainties given the methods for determining, calculating or estimating the underlying information. It is important to understand our assurance opinions in this context. Our independent assurance statement provides no assurance on the maintenance and integrity of the Gold Fields' website, including controls used to achieve this, and in particular, whether any changes may have occurred to the information since it was first published.
| Donald Gibson Partner |
Jennifer Iansen-Rogers Review Partner, ERM CVS, London |
27 March 2018
ERM Southern Africa (Pty) Ltd, Johannesburg, South Africa
www.erm.com
Email: donald.gibson@erm.com
ERM Southern Africa (Pty) Ltd and ERM Certification and Verification Services are members of the ERM Group. Our processes are designed and implemented to ensure that the work we undertake with clients is free from bias and conflict of interest. The ERM and ERM CVS staff that have undertaken work on this assurance engagement provide no consultancy related services to Gold Fields in any respect related to the subject matter assured.