AngloGold Ashanti has put in place a comprehensive programme to ensure effective management of the health and well-being of its employees working underground mines at South Africa and Obuasi in Ghana. The programme, “Well-being at the Workplace” adopts integrated approach to managing the health and welfare of the miners. According to the Company’s 2006 Report to Society, the fundamental concept underlying the approach was the company’s aim of engaging healthy and productive people at the beginning of their mining careers and to ensure that they remained so till they left the employment of the company. The Report said: “This concept recognizes the intrinsic interdependence of safety, occupational health, environment and productivity and requires an integrated and co-ordinated approach by the safety, occupational health, environment, medical and human resources discipline”. The Report stated that the programme has three phases - the pre-employment/engagement, the employment phase during which employees are exposed to the social and occupational environment and the termination/post employment phase. It said AngloGold Ashanti set a long-term objective to eliminate all accidents but regrettably, “there were 37 occupational fatalities at all the operations and 1,288 time lost injuries”. “Although, the group’s safety and health performance has improved significantly since the formation of AngloGold in 1998, we have not achieved our long-term target of eliminating fatal accidents and occupational illness, particularly at the African operations,” it noted. The Report stressed that AngloGold Ashanti would ever be committed to comply with all relevant occupational health and safety laws, regulations and standards. It added that the Company was also committed to providing a working environment that was conducive to safety and health and also provide all necessary resources to enable compliance with these safety health principles. Source: GNA