Safety

Introduction

Gold Fields' commitment to health and safety as our foremost priority reflects the importance of safeguarding and promoting the welfare of our employees and contractors, maintaining operational continuity and protecting our reputation. During 2018, we remained focused on improving our performance and entrenching the requirement to operate safely into all daily activities. Gold Fields' target is the elimination of all fatalities and serious injuries, and our ultimate goal is zero harm.

Safety forms a fundamental component of performance management, and our annual performance bonus - for executives, managers and the wider workforce - contains a substantial safety component. Furthermore, maintaining safe and healthy working conditions is a key compliance issue.

Our first and most important value, "If we cannot mine safely, we will not mine", remains critical to the sustainability of our organisation. As specified in our Occupational Health and Safety Policy Statement, updated in 2018, we endeavour to continually improve our occupational health and safety performance by providing a workplace that is conducive to health and safety.

Our Group Safety Leadership Forum, formed in 2017, is overseeing the development of the Group-wide safety strategy to further improve our safety performance, continually embed safety as a line management responsibility, and share learnings and good practices. The strategy comprises three pillars, namely systems and processes, safety leadership, and safe behaviour, that will direct our safety programmes.

The most important programmes focus on the elimination of material unwanted events (MUEs), fatalities and serious potential incidents. MUEs in health and safety, environment and community have been identified and prioritised in each region. Gold Fields' MUEs in the safety and health area are dropped objects, light vehicles, working at heights, hazardous materials, particularly cyanide, confined spaces, slope stability, explosives and fires, tailings facility incidents, community activism and protests, and surface water pollution.

During 2017 Gold Fields adopted the International Council on Mining & Metals' (ICMM) critical control management of MUEs, which entails listing MUEs, identifying controls that could prevent these incidents from occurring and reducing the impact should they occur, selecting those controls that are critical or essential and, finally, bedding down the controls and verifying their effectiveness. Our regions make quarterly presentations to the Board's Safety, Health and Sustainable Development (SHSD) Committee on safety-related MUEs and their critical controls. Health, environmental and community MUEs and their critical controls are presented every alternate quarter. Critical controls will be independently verified during 2019.

All of the Group's operations are certified to the OHSAS 18001 international health and safety management system standard. There are opportunities for us to improve these systems, including upgrading to the ISO 45001 standard over the next two years and increasing use of leading indicators.

Our safety leadership forum has initiated the development and roll out of a "Courageous Leadership" programme to align all employees to a common set of beliefs and attitudes to health and safety. This programme will be cascaded to every employee in the organisation. As a supporting and complementary initiative to the leadership programme, the "Vital Behaviours" programmes will be implemented in all regions, based on the success of this initiative at our Australian operations where we have seen fundamental shifts in the safety culture.

We are very conscious of major incidents in the mining industry globally and consequently implement mitigating actions to prevent the risk of similar incidents at our operations. We have benefited from greater sharing of information about fatal incidents between ICMM members.

The work on safety is integral to our operational discipline and is accepted as the foundation for improved operational performance. As such, pursuing safety and productivity at the same time are mutually reinforcing.

For details of our safety and health management approach, policies and guidelines go to www.goldfields.com/sustainability.php.

Group safety performance

Our generally improved safety performance during 2018 was overshadowed by a fatal incident in which our South Deep colleague, Ananias Mosololi, a load haul dump operator, was trapped between the door and the cabin of the dumper he was operating underground. Following the incident, and the subsequent joint investigations with the regulator, South Deep conducted a comprehensive analysis to understand what took place and prevent its recurrence.

In a non-mining-related incident, a member of the Community Security Task Force, Francis Yeboah, drowned in a settling pond at our Tarkwa mine in Ghana. The local police did not suspect foul play in the incident.

During 2018, Gold Fields' safety performance improved significantly from 2017. We recorded one fatal injury compared with three fatal injuries in 2017. Our TRIFR for the year improved by 18% to 1.83 injuries per million hours worked in 2018 from 2.24 in 2017, exceeding our target of a 12% reduction. The TRIFR among employees in 2018 was 1.94 (2017: 2.69) and among contractors 1.75 (2017: 2.16). The number of recordable injuries fell to 99 in 2018 (2017: 138). Of the 99 injuries, 43 were employee injuries (2017: 75) and 56 were contractor injuries (2017: 63).

The elimination of serious injuries, along with fatalities, is viewed as a safety priority. During 2018 we finalised the definition of a serious injury (see in table footnote below). Gold Fields recorded 18 serious injuries in 2018 (2017: 28), which will serve as a baseline for future performance.

To further entrench safe behaviour in our workplace, the Board broadened the 2019 safety performance scorecards by adding a number of leading indicators to the current lagging indicators to measure safety performance. These leading indicators are the number of safety engagements (introduced to the LTIP in 2018), improved reporting of near-miss incidents, and timeous close-out of corrective actions on serious potential incidents. The elimination of serious injuries will be included in scorecards for the first time in 2019.

Group safety performance

Regional safety performance

Americas region

			2018		2017
	Fatalities		0		0
	TRIFR		0.54		0.19
	Recordable injuries		3		1
	Safety Engagement Rate (SER)*		1.14		0.70

* The SER is an LTIP metric and equals the number of in field engagements divided by the number of man hours, multiplied by 1,000. The SER index for 2017 is used as our baseline.

Gold Fields' external auditors recommended Cerro Corona for recertification to OHSAS 18001 in 2018. There were no non-conformances.

Our visible leadership programme obtained an SER of 1.14 for 2018, above the target of 0.73. Our behaviour-based safety programme had a 165% compliance, which was 65% above target. We trained 148 new employees to act as observers of critical tasks, of which 36 are Gold Fields employees and 112 contractors.

We continued to invest in the training and development of our employees and contractors to reinforce their safety knowledge and to motivate good behaviour. We conducted two-hour workshops throughout the year, where all Gold Fields employees and contractors completed awareness programmes on critical control management. Our Cerro Corona mine has developed a mobile phone app which allows managers and employees to capture safety-related information and share this immediately with their colleagues.

Coca leaf usage has an adverse impact on alertness levels, and progressive efforts to eradicate the consumption thereof through awareness programmes for employees and contractors to improve their safety, health and wellness, continued in 2018. These programmes are also part of our induction programme for new employees. Furthermore, we completed an awareness programme with 130 families in our host communities.

Australia region

			2018		2017
	Fatalities		0		0
	TRIFR		8.27		10.44
	Recordable injuries		46		61
	SER		6.50		4.84

The region's TRIFR reduced to an all-time low of 8.27. This represents a 67% improvement in the rate since the current safety strategy was introduced in 2013.

At the heart of Gold Fields Australia's safety efforts are the ongoing "Visible Felt Leadership" and "Vital Behaviours" programmes, both of which were introduced in 2014. Our annual survey among employees indicated that the workforce believe that safety rules are carefully observed even if it means work is slowed down (82% agreement). These programmes have also been integrated into the construction activities at Gruyere.

Another important component of our strategy is the use of innovation and technology to reduce exposure to risk. A key project has been the deployment of the Newtrax system at our Granny Smith mine. This system allows for real time monitoring of personnel underground and also immediately notifies personnel of an emergency that requires them to move to a refuge chamber. In addition, the deployment of proximity detection has been completed for heavy equipment in the St Ives pits and underground at Granny Smith - it integrates with the Newtrax system and operates on a frequency that provides for better signal penetration around corners.

Remote loading at Granny Smith and at the Invincible underground at St Ives has also been introduced, which allows an operator to move material underground from a dedicated operating room on surface. The remote loading system at Agnew is still operated from underground with plans to move this activity to the surface. By moving personnel to a surface environment we are reducing employees' exposure to risk. The system also includes guidance and automation technologies which will remove risks associated with human error.

A biannual review of all safety and environmental-related incidents at our sites identified that field-level risk assessments were not being undertaken to the extent and quality required. Based on the outcomes of our 2018 reviews, we will focus on the following in 2019:

• Refresher training to emphasise the importance of anticipating risk, and to ensure that field-level risk assessments are being conducted as required
• The majority of incidents, though relatively minor in nature, are dominated by employees placing themselves, particularly their hands (50% of the injuries in 2019), at risk
• Integration of safety performance into talent management protocols needs to be investigated
• A renewed focus on safety among contractor workers
• Aligning our operations to a common leading and lagging indicator scorecard

The implementation of the SER continues to gain momentum at all sites, and a standard has been developed to ensure that appropriate governance protocols are in place.

West Africa region

			2018		2017
	Fatalities		0		0
	TRIFR		0.49		0.50
	Recordable injuries		12		12
	SER		4.30		2.23

Damang's TRIFR in 2018 was 0.80 and Tarkwa's 0.31, resulting in a combined rate of 0.49 for 2018 (2017: 0.50). Both mines accelerated their SERs, with Damang and Tarkwa recording 5.17 and 3.82, respectively. Both mines have observed improvements in safety behaviour since the introduction of this leading indicator.

37 near-miss incidents were investigated by the mines during 2018 to identify their main causes, which included:

• Maintenance culture and operation of defective equipment
• Supervision and risk assessments
• Limited fatigue management training for some contract drivers

All significant investigation findings were either rectified immediately or action plans were put in place to address them.

A focus of safety management in 2018 was our open pits at both mines. High-risk working areas were being cordoned off and access limited, potential water seepages through the pit high walls were re-engineered, and warning signs were erected at designated areas in the pits to caution all personnel of possible dangers of rock falls.

Tarkwa and Damang launched a joint "Take 5" safety campaign to reinforce the five steps required to ensure safety at the mine, being Stop and Think, Look for Hazards, Assess the Risk, Make the Changes, and Do the Job Safely.

South Africa region

			2018		2017
	Fatalities		1		2
	TRIFR		2.07		2.91
	Recordable injuries		38		64
	SER		0.49		0.80

All lagging safety indicators showed an improvement at South Deep during 2018. However, these were overshadowed by the fatal incident recorded in October (2017: two fatalities). The mine's TRIFR improved by 29%, LTIFR by 41%, and serious injury frequency rate (SIFR) by 43%, due, in part, to the 45-day strike action at South Deep which halted operations.

The improvement in safety can be attributed to the Purposeful Visible Felt Leadership initiative launched during the year, which demonstrated safety leadership to all employees by focusing on engagement, key leading indicators and critical controls. The introduction of new shift arrangements resulted in improved supervision, which enabled employees and supervisors to focus more on safety-related issues.

Prior to the fatality in October, South Deep achieved over two million fatality-free shifts. After the fatal incident, an in-loco investigation was conducted by the DMR, in conjunction with organised labour and management, which led to a section 54 instruction being issued to halt all trackless mobile machinery.

The DMR issued an additional eight section 54 instructions during the year (2017: 15) for, among others, ineffective secondary support, poor housekeeping, inadequate dust suppression, poor water controls, and unsafe working conditions. These resulted in partial production stoppages. The mine seeks to address the underlying reasons for section 54 instructions as soon as feasible, and has over the year implemented mitigation strategies, such as a change in shift configuration to improve supervision, changes to tramming shift arrangements and dedicated operational maintenance teams.

Seven gravity-related fall-of-ground accidents occurred in 2018 compared to nine in 2017, amid a strong focus on primary and secondary ground support. Seismic-related events at South Deep occur frequently, but the mine is working with a number of academic institutions to achieve greater predictability of events. As a result, the number of seismic damage incidents in 2018 fell by 33% to 26. No injuries were reported during these events, but the resultant rock bursts did damage sidewalls and/or hanging walls. This required that the affected areas to be cleaned out and re-supported.

As part of South Deep's effort to engineer-out safety risks, a proximity detection system (PDS) was rolled out which warns both pedestrians and drivers of railed and trackless vehicles of each other's proximity. South Deep made steady progress on the implementation of the remedial action plan on the PDS for both rail-bound equipment and trackless mobile machinery. Our aim for this system is to stop and slow down vehicles, as well as warn of unauthorised positions and entries.