News:
Assurance Group Meets in Santiago, Chile

Eight New Members for Assurance Group

Revised Charters to Establish Project Structure

Finance, Mining
& Sustainable Development

New Brochure from GMI

In Brief …

Heads-Up for …

For a printable version of the MMSD news bulletin, click here.

Assurance Group Meets in Santiago, Chile

MMSD's Assurance Group held its third meeting in Santiago, Chile on January 22-23 2001. Building on the Assurance Group gathering, several other meetings were organised in an effort to increase the participation and engagement of local stakeholders. These included a press conference, a workshop on small-scale mining, a tour of a smelter and an abandoned mine, and informative sessions with Latin American representatives of governmental agencies, the private sector and civil society.

The Work Group informed on the status of the overall project. In addition, four of MMSD's Regional Partners-from Southern Africa, Australia, North America and Latin America-described their progress and plans in their respective regions. Members of the Work Group gave an update on the status of the European and the Philippines/Indonesia regional processes. These presentations generated a great deal of interest among Assurance Group members and sparked off a productive dialogue. The differences between the Northern and the Southern regional processes-one of which was consumption and production priorities-served as an illustration of some of the challenges ahead.

The Work Group also presented their current understanding of how the Final Report is to be structured and developed. The Assurance Group provided useful guidance and advice and expressed interest in actively participating in making the final product useful and practical. For this matter, the Assurance Group also provided comment on the working paper-Planning for Outcomes-and discussed more effective ways to organise future feedback to the Work Group.

Internal administrative matters were addressed as well. Jay Hair and Duma Nkosi were formally elected as Assurance Group Chair and Vice-Chair respectively. In addition, eight new members were appointed (four of which were present) and a revised charter, outlining the Assurance Group responsibilities and ways of working, was approved. (See next news items for more detail)

On the eve of the meeting and aiming to gain a first-hand perspective on the reality of the minerals cycle, Assurance Group members and a number of local stakeholders visited the Caletones smelter, and Sewel, an abandoned mining town, both south of Santiago. These visits proved to be both insightful and productive to the participants.

As indicated, the Work Group-in coordination with the Latin American Regional Partners-organised a series of informative meetings with local stakeholders. Representatives from all Chilean government agencies holding a stake in mining were present, ranging from environmental to health to mining and economy. Industry representatives from the Chilean mining industry and other regional observers also expressed their views on mining and the sustainable development agenda. Representatives from civil society-including academics from Chile and Brazil, and NGOs-also brought forth their perspectives. In all cases, the attendees showed substantial interest in the Project and in potential opportunities for contribution at a regional and global level through this process.

Eight New Members for Assurance Group

Four of the eight new Assurance Group members were present at the recent meeting in Santiago. The elections were the result of a selection process undertaken by a Nominating Committee established after the second Assurance Group meeting in August. Chaired by the then Interim Chair of the Assurance Group Jay Hair (now formally elected as chair), the Nominating Committee consisted of four members of the Assurance Group and two outside members.

The process started with a gaps analysis of the existing Assurance Group membership by constituency/interest group, regional coverage and expertise. A call for nominations was then distributed to the 2800 individuals on the MMSD mailing list as well as being published on the MMSD website. This was accompanied by phone and email networking with members of the Assurance Group, with NGOs, the financial community, UN and other international organisations, and labour and industry in southern countries to identify potential candidates.

Sixty-three nominations were received in total. Recommendations made by the Nominating Committee were sent to the Assurance Group towards the end of December. Candidates were chosen through an electronic vote, and contacted in early January.

The new members represent a diverse and very experienced set of individuals. They are Jacqueline Aloisi-Larderel (France), Anna Cederstav (Sweden), Cholpon Dyikhanova (Kyrgyzstan), Colin Filer (United Kingdom), Gerard Holden (United Kingdom), Namakau Kaingu (Zambia), John Stewart (South Africa), and Senzeni Zokwana (South Africa).

Jay Hair, chair of the Assurance Group, expressed his satisfaction with the overall nominations and selection process and commented on the expertise and insights that the new members will bring to their discussions.

Brief biographies of the new Assurance Group members will appear in the next issue of the bulletin and will also be available on the MMSD's Assurance Group web page, www.iied.org/mmsd/assurgroup.html.

Revised Charters to Establish Project Structure

The revised charter governing Assurance Group's responsibilities and ways of working was unanimously approved by the Group during the meeting.

Along with revised charters for the Sponsors Group and the Work Group of MMSD, the charter underpinning the Assurance Group lays a foundation of independence and transparency for MMSD. In particular, it clearly sets out the purpose and roles of the Group and its process of decision-making. It gives the Assurance Group the right to comment on and endorse the Work Plan and final report of the MMSD project, and individual members are encouraged to express publicly their opinion-positive or negative.

These revised charters are the result of a thorough drafting and consultation process carried out by the Charter Working Group. This was established following the Strategic Planning Workshop in May 2000, which called for further assurance that the work and governance structure of MMSD was open and balanced. Chaired by Jay Hair, the remit of the Charter Working Group was to review the draft charters of the Assurance Group, the Work Group and the Sponsors Group. Following the process of drafting and discussion within the Charter Working Group, the three charters were submitted to the Assurance Group, Sponsors Group and Work Group for final approval.

The full text of the charters is available online at the MMSD Assurance Group web page, www.iied.org/mmsd/assurgroup.html.

For more on the outcomes of the Assurance Group meeting, please contact patricio.leyton@iied.org.

Finance, Mining and Sustainable Development

In preparation for a conference on 'Finance, Mining and the Transition to Sustainable Development,' scoping meetings were held on January 10-12 2001 in Washington DC. These were jointly organised by the World Bank's Mining Department, MMSD and UNEP. The discussions gathered groups of 12-15 participants and brought together representatives from the financial community and the mining industry-private banks, insurance companies, export credit agencies, brokerage houses, rating agencies, public sector lenders and others-as well as from civil society, labour organisations and governments. The discussions revolved around three topics:

• How relevant to the financial community is the performance of mining operations in terms of environmental and social sustainability, and are there any trends that might predict an increasing relevance?



• Would better information about these issues improve and facilitate the dealings of financial institutions with the mining industry?



• What mechanisms should be explored that would make such information available more easily and reliably?

The ideas discussed during these scoping meetings will feed into the design of a high-level conference, planned by the World Bank's Mining Department, together with UNEP and MMSD, for April 9 in Washington DC. At the conference, key figures from the finance community, the mining industry, governments and civil society from across the world will be invited to explore the link between the financial performance of mining operations and issues of sustainable development.

More participants-representing different regions and stakeholder groups-are being sought for this event. For further information, contact juan.velasquez@iied.org.

NEW BROCHURE FROM GMI

The Global Mining Initiative (GMI) has produced a new brochure describing its activities. The GMI-led by large mining and minerals companies-is a programme aiming to ensure that the mining and minerals industry is conducted in a way that is responsive to sustainable patterns of economic development. The GMI gave the original impetus to MMSD, which has now become an independent project.

If you wish to receive the brochure and further updates from the GMI, please get in touch with them at contact@globalmining.com or phone +44 (0) 20 7753 2273. You can also visit their website at www.globalmining.com.

IN BRIEF…

• Biological Diversity/Protected Areas. MMSD will begin working with Conservation International as well as the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) on studies related to biological diversity and protected areas. An Advisory Committee is being formed and nominations are being requested. Contact elisabeth.wood@iied.org.



• Small-Scale Mining. An initial workshop-aiming to start defining regional priorities-was held in Santiago, Chile on January 24. Representatives of regional stakeholders, including small-scale miners, NGOs, the United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), companies, government among others took part in this initial dialogue. Similar meetings are being planned for other regions. Contact elisabeth.wood@iied.org.

HEADS-UP FOR…

• First outputs from Advisory Committee on Large Volume Waste to be announced in late February. They will be soon available for public review on our website www.iied.org/mmsd.



• Scoping meetings to be held in the Former Soviet Union in late March 2001 in preparation for a possible research workshop. Contact silvia.kyeyune@iied.org for more.



• process seeking greater participation of indigenous communities in the MMSD process is at its planning stages. Contact frank.mcshane@iied.org for further details.



• On 15-16 February MMSD is participating in a roundtable discussion organised by the Royal Institute of International Affairs, under Chatham House rules, on the social responsibility of the Canadian mining industry.



• The MMSD-PriceWaterhouseCoopers Mining Survey is now underway.

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