JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – After the fatalities of four employees during the past year, triple-listed South32 needs to initiate a complete step-change in the way it approaches its safety commitments in South Africa.

The diversified mining company has therefore committed to investing time, energy and leadership into making a meaningful and sustainable change “to get this right”, CEO Graham Kerr said on Thursday.

“While our operating performance was strong [during the 2016 financial year], our safety performance in the past year has been unacceptable. We need a complete step-change in our approach and behaviour,” he told media during a post annual general meeting conference call.

In July last year, a contractor working at the carbon bake furnace at the Hillside aluminium smelter, in Richards Bay, was fatally injured, while a worker at the Mamatwan manganese mine, in Hotazel, in the Northern Cape, was fatally injured at the rail load-out station.

In June 2016, two fatalities were recorded in separate incidents. One occurred while workers were transporting construction material to the Central Block Development at the Wessels manganese mine, in Hotazel; the other was a fall-of-ground incident at the Klipspruit colliery, in Mpumalanga.

The group’s total recordable injury frequency rate increased from 5.8 to 7.7 per million hours worked, notwithstanding having the relevant protocols in place.

South32 says it was “determined” to see measurable change and had implemented its "care strategy" across the group to create the step-change it sought and to improve safety performance based on three elements – inclusivity, improvement culture and well-designed work.

“We are developing a culture of care and accountability by building an inclusive workplace where everyone feels comfortable to bring their whole self to work – where work is well designed and we continuously improve and learn,” said Kerr.

Meanwhile, the group boasts a comprehensive safety management system that establishes minimum mandatory controls for eight key material risk areas at its operations.

These include confined space events; dropped and falling objects; fall- or movement-of-ground; lifting events; light-vehicle events; loss of containment of materials; mobile equipment events; and falling from height.

“Minimum mandatory controls are also specified for two control systems - permit to work and isolation; which all of our operations are required to meet,” he noted.