Platinum producer Lonmin, a sponsor of this year’s Investing in African Mining Indaba, says the event was successful for the company, as it emerged from a difficult year in 2012, and needed to connect directly with many of its stakeholders.

Lonmin spokesperson Sue Vey tells Mining Weekly that the company used the opportunity to help rebuild the company’s brand, restore investor confidence and forge productive relationships with all its stakeholders.

“We believe the value of the Mining Indaba lies in its opportunities for companies such as Lonmin to network with international, regional and local parties.

“This year, we were successful in communi-cating our focus areas for 2013, which included a safe ramp-up to productivity and ensuring continuous and reliable production; restoring investor faith and confidence in the company by focusing on consistently and sustainably producing under difficult trading conditions; rebuilding relationships of mutual benefit and trust with nonfinancial stakeholders by enhancing our social value proposition; and working on collaborative efforts with govern-ment and other industry players to ensure we can deliver the financial returns to justify further investment, while intensifying efforts to fast-track a model of doing business which meets the expectations of nonfinancial stake-holders,” says Vey.

She notes that the company does face chal-lenges in terms of the international platinum industry.

“The platinum industry worldwide con- tinues to be depressed. Producers have mini-mal influence over price and most platinum miners are struggling with profitability. This will ultimately inform the decisions we make and there will be some short-term consequences to building value for all stake-holders on a sustainable basis.

“Almost 80% of our economic value is already distributed to our employees in the form of salaries and wages; our revenue for 2012 was $1.614-billion. Without a change in the market, creating value for all stakeholders will involve necessary trade-offs. Everyone affected needs to accept this and assist us in managing expectations accordingly,” states Vey.

Going forward, she says, Lonmin is focused on rebuilding and growing the company.

“We have had a good first quarter and are currently focused on ensuring that this continues,” she says.

Vey tells Mining Weekly that at the com-pany’s recent yearly general meeting, chairperson Roger Phillimore announced five initiatives designed to improve relations with employees and deliver enhanced value for all stakeholders.

She says Lonmin has started working towards implementing these initiatives, which it regards as fundamental to mining in the twenty-first century.

However, Vey notes that most of the initiatives cannot be carried out by Lonmin alone and that the company will need to work closely with all its stakeholders, including government, unions, employees and others, to achieve its aims.

The first initiative entails employee rela-tions.

“This includes a renegotiation of the current union-recognition dispensation and participation in industry discussions to estab- lish an industry forum for centralised engage- ment,” says Vey.

The second initiative centres on empower- ment.

“This involves considering the imple-mentation of an employee share ownership plan, a community trust and closer cooperation on procurement, as well as small, medium-sized and microenterprise devel-opment for the greater Lonmin community,” she says.

The third initiative focuses on the issue of migrant and local labour.

“This involves reviewing the viability of alternative shift and leave patterns that will enable our employees to return to their families much more regu-larly than what has previously been possible,” states Vey.

The fourth initiative highlights the use of invested capital and infrastructure.

“Lonmin is investigating our working relationship with unions and industry peers to make better use of our infrastructure and, hence, invested capital,” she notes.

The fifth initiative concentrates on housing and accommodation.

“Lonmin will complete the conversion of all its hostels into decent and affordable family or single-accommodation units by 2014. In addition, the project team will identify the most effective ways of improv- ing employee living conditions and develop programmes to deliver on these commitments.