An international mining group has won a sustainability award for community work in a town near one if its mineral operations.
The South African company RBM (Richards Bay Minerals) received the Worldaware business award for sustainable development for a series of measures that judges said had improved the health, education and self-reliance of people in the town of Mbonambi, near one of its mines in the KwaZulu-Natal region of South Africa.
RBM has built five new schools and five health clinics to serve the town, which has a population of 30,000, and has sponsored literacy classes for local people. It has also tried to improve wealth generation in the area by giving training and advice to co-operatives and signing contracts with small businesses to supply its mining operations with goods.
It has a specialist member of staff to create opportunities for local businesses, a contract with local taxi co-operatives, runs a small business advice centre and supports communal gardens where families grow vegetables. It spends $1.1million (£777,000) a year on various projects in the town.
The Worldaware judges said RBM’s activities were ‘an example of a major international company going well beyond normal commercial dictates to support a large rural community’.
Runners-up to RBM for the Worldaware award were Thames Water for a scheme to bring piped water to a neglected area of Jakarta in Indonesia, and Tropical Cable and Conductor for community involvement connected with work to improve electricity supplies in Ghana.
Worldaware is a 30-year-old organization that focuses on third world development.