Health and safety

We regret to report seven fatalities at the South Africa region and one fatality at Tarkwa in the West Africa region during the quarter. At the South Africa region, three accidents were seismic related and four were due to gravity falls of ground.

The Group’s fatal injury frequency rate regressed from 0.13 to 0.20. The lost day injury frequency rate regressed from 3.76 to 4.86 and the days lost frequency rate regressed from 171 to 201. The recent trend in our rates is deeply concerning.

Despite the regressions, there have been significant achievements during the quarter in the Group. KDC again achieved one million fatality free shifts. Our Cerro Corona operation in Peru continues its sterling safety performance, with no lost day injuries recorded since 2009. St Ives, Agnew and Damang have also reported zero lost day injuries for the quarter.

The strategy to eliminate fatalities in the Group remains unchanged with two areas of focus, being engineering out the risk and ensuring compliance to internal standards.

Definitions

Lost Day Injury (LDI) takes into account any injury occurring in the workplace where a person is unable to attend a full shift due to his injury at any time following the injury.

Days Lost takes into account the number of days lost due to injuries recorded.