Community relations in Australia

Context

Our operations in Australia are situated in remote regions of Western Australia. Our host community definition covers communities within the Eastern Goldfields region, with a primary postal address that is located within a determined perimeter of the mine. Previously, given the Fly-in, Fly-out nature of most of our mines, we extended that definition to include Perth
Our host communities are home to an estimated 37,000 people in the Shires of Laverton, Menzies, Kalgoorlie, Coolgardie and Leonora. The majority of the people reside in the city of Kalgoorlie, near our St Ives mine, with an estimated population of over 29,000. The Indigenous population makes up only about 9% of this total, with a greater representation in isolated locations
Indigenous People are a key part of our host communities, and important stakeholders for our operations in Western Australia. This includes those Indigenous People who hold, or claim to hold, Native Title rights and interests over the area on which our sites are located
The combined area of registered and determined Native Title claims over Western Australia is approximately 90% of the state’s land mass. All Gold Fields’ operations in Australia are covered by Native Title determinations or claims
Many of our sustainability projects have been funded by the Gold Fields Australia Foundation. For more details on the Foundation go to www. goldfields.com/societalstakeholders. php

Build relationships and trust

Indigenous People strategy

Because of their traditional rights and important connection to land, Indigenous People are key stakeholders whose support is critical in achieving social acceptance. The relationship with our indigenous stakeholders has been focused in recent years on management of cultural heritage in our areas of operation. The current status of our relationships are:

At Gruyere, we have built our relationship with the Yilka People (who are the determined Native Title holders for the area, together with the Sullivan Edwards family) through a formal Native Title agreement. Through regular engagement we have been able to pursue opportunities for employment and contracting, as well as manage environmental and cultural heritage issues throughout the construction phase
At St Ives, we engage with the Ngadju People, the determined native holders for the area, with a focus on the conduct of heritage surveys. We also participate in community activities in the nearby town of Kambalda and the city of Kalgoorlie
At Agnew, we have relationships with the Tjiwarl People (determined Native Title holders for part of the land) and the Wutha People (Native Title claimants over the remaining part of the Agnew property). We regularly engage with both groups in relation to the conduct of heritage surveys, and have been exploring opportunities to formalise these arrangements with both groups
At Granny Smith, our key relationship is with the local community at Laverton. We continue to build on our relationship with Indigenous People in the area through the conduct of heritage surveys and cultural awareness programmes

During 2018, we launched Gold Fields’ Aboriginal Participation Strategy, based on three pillars – societal staging, employment attraction and retention, and value chain participation – and identified actions to be completed under each pillar. Many of these had a focus on the employment of and procurement from Indigenous People (refer to “Create and share value”) with some early successes. We identified a need to bring our existing initiatives and planned programmes together under a consolidated strategy. This strategy was launched in Q1 2019 and seeks to ensure that Gold Fields’ Australian region has a strategy that is aligned with key internal Group policies, as well as external guidelines.

The key steps under this strategy are to:

Engage to build trusted relationships and resolve conflict
Deliver benefits that have real impact
Demonstrate respect

Manage risk and impact

MATERIAL UNWANTED EVENTS AT OUR SITES

Material unwanted events (MUEs) at our sites can affect our social licence to operate. This is how we addressed them:

Completed a bow-tie analysis for 15 safety-related, and 13 consolidated, health, environment and community MUEs
Developed audit tools to address the 15 health, environment and community MUEs
Aligned our sites to the critical control management methodologies
Developed a regional heritage management standard

Create and share value

HOST COMMUNITY PROCUREMENT

During 2018, our supply chain department commenced development of a host community vendor programme to generate greater opportunities for local businesses to supply to our operations. This was achieved by investing A$198m (US$147m) – 24% of total spend – in host community procurement, exceeding our 2018 target of 18%, through 279 host community suppliers
Pursuing procurement initiatives to enable host community and Indigenous people to participate in the value chain
The engagement of Indigenous People in the conduct of heritage surveys and cultural awareness training of our workforce
Supporting our mining contractor, Downer EDI Mining, to identify and develop opportunities for Indigenous contracting opportunities at Gruyere

HOST COMMUNITY EMPLOYMENT

Our Australian operations have a strategy in place to increase employment of Indigenous People by growing a pipeline of people who are work-ready, developing a culturally inclusive workplace and creating broader opportunities for service provisions to the mines. During 2018, we achieved the following:

We exceeded our target for employment of Indigenous People through additional job opportunities
We continued discussions with key contractors at Gruyere to increase the jobs for and employment of Indigenous People
We engaged with training companies to assist with the identification of potential traineeship programmes for members or our host communities

For more details of our host community programmes see Value creation and distribution and Stakeholder relations.

OTHER MATERIAL VALUE CREATION PROJECTS

The following projects were funded by the Gold Fields Australia Foundation:

Our St Ives operation provides a three-year, A$150,000 (US$112,000) grant to the East Kalgoorlie Primary School to support around 150 Aboriginal students and their families
Annual funding of A$30,000 (US$22,000) provided to Teach, Learn Grow, a programme that addresses educational inequality at schools in our host communities
We contributed A$50,000 (US$37,000) to the Lions Outback Vision programme, which will allow eye specialists to perform diabetic retina screening in the Goldfields region, particularly for Aboriginal people

Gold Fields Australia funds Football West, the governing body for fast-growing soccer in Western Australia, through an annual sponsorship of A$100,000 (US$75,000) for three years. Football West has a strong commitment to the region, inclusiveness and cultural and gender diversity.

Measure actions and impacts

Australia SED SED spend

Australia SED by type 2018

Engagement with communities

2017		2018
10		87

Grievances

One grievance was carried over from 2017, which was lodged on behalf of the Sullivan Edwards Native Title group and related to the Gruyere project. While not formally closed, Gold Fields has received no further communication regarding the issue. The Sullivan Edwards families were found to hold Native Title by the Federal Court of Australia in 2016, together with the Yilka People. However, prior to this determination, the Sullivan Edwards Native Title claim was being run as a separate and unregistered claim, which meant that they did not have the same procedural rights as the Yilka People, whose Native Title claim was registered. The Yilka People and the Sullivan Edwards families are currently engaged in a process to appoint a single corporation to represent them. We continue to engage with the Yilka and Sullivan Edwards families together, wherever possible.

Beyond this grievance, in 2018 we had one further community-related grievance, which was resolved.