BCBusiness

BCBUSINESS.CA DECEMBER/JANUARY 2019 BCBUSINESS 47 mining companies are playing ball, they need to strive for a much better standard on the international stage. In her view, the mining association's TSM eort smacks of the fox guarding the henhouse. Case in point: in 2016, MAC gave a TSM Leadership Award to Hudbay Minerals for its Hudson Bay Mining and Smelting Co. at the same time the com- pany was defending itself against alleged human rights infringements at its former mine in Guatemala. "We don't think TSM is the highest standard that it could be," Coumans says from MiningWatch Canada's Ottawa headquarters. Activists and industry watchers are anticipating the full implementation of an independent set of standards known as the Initiative for Responsible Mining Assurance (IRMA), she notes. The fact that IRMA has been 12 years in the making and remains at the draft stage is a testament to the socioeconomic complexity of mining. Where TSM was driven internally by the Canadian mining sector, IRMA emerged after citizen activists started showing up with placards at retailers like American luxury jewelry chain Tiany & Co. in the mid-2000s, when the pub- lic shaming of so-called blood diamonds from Africa was hitting a fever pitch and consumers demanded to know more about precious-gem and metals procure- ment policies. When these retailers approached non-governmental organizations for guidance in identifying the "green min- ers," Seattle-based IRMA coordinator Aimee Boulanger explains, they found there was no credible body to help them separate good and bad actors. "It has been a hard process because mining is so complex. No two sites are the same, from the geochemical conditions to the water conditions of a mine, or the sociopolitical conditions of a given juris- diction," Boulanger says. "The strength of IRMA will be the fact that the third-party veri•cation will be just as important as the standards themselves." IRMA, which Boulanger hopes to see fully rolled out in 2019, has a heavy- weight steering committee with repre- sentatives from the mining giants Anglo American and ArcelorMittal, down- stream purchasers like Microsoft Corp. and Tiany, human rights and environ- mental non-governmental organizations, labour g roups and Indigenous leaders. Boulanger places mining in a similar phase as the garment and forestry industries more than a decade ago, when consumers and activists began placing their practices in a glaring spotlight, whether it was a sweat- shop in Bangladesh or old-growth clear-cutting in B.C. Such pressure helped put corporate and social responsibility at the top of boardroom agendas in those industries; Boulanger believes mining's day of reckoning is next. "My hope is that CEOs will realize that they won't be able to avoid this level of corporate responsibility inde•nitely," she says. Mining is already a much dierent world than it was in the 1990s. Organi- zations like ResponsibleSteel and the Responsible Jewellery Council, both based in the U.K., are targeting their sectors to raise ethical standards. Loose language from the Canadian govern- ment exhorting Canadian companies to respect the law of whatever country they're operating in no longer cuts it. Consumers, buyers and now Canadian courts are expecting more. In turn, pending trials like the ones faced by Tahoe Resources and Nevsun Resources in Vancouver, and by Hudbay Minerals in Ontario, have put Canadian miners on notice. "Canada is actively mining in many countries where the rule of law is loose," attorney Fiorante says. "We're trying to place legal responsibility right at the top of these companies." Ÿ IRMA's Aimee Boulanger places mining in a similar phase as the garment and forestry industries more than a decade ago, when consumers and activists began placing their practices in a glaring spotlight, whether it was a sweatshop in Bangladesh or old- growth clear-cutting in B.C.

• Cover