ICMM presents new guidance note on handling and resolving local level concerns and grievances

The International Council of Mining and Metals, (ICMM) has presented “Human Rights in the Metals & Mining Industry: Handling and Resolving Local Level Concerns & Grievances”, the second in a series of publications designed to help member companies deal with challenging issues in this area.

The publication sets out good practice approaches to help companies design and/or enhance existing complaints procedures or mechanisms.  Focussing on this issue, which was highlighted in the recent publication, “Human Rights in the Metals & Mining Industry: Overview, Management Approach and Issues” complements ICMM members’ work at the operational level to build strong, trusting relations with local communities around their operations.

This publication aims to:

· Describe a set of ‘overarching design principles’ that provide basic, high-level guidance for companies developing complaints mechanisms;

· Outline some basic criteria to help operations ‘assess the nature of and potential for complaints’ and so to develop a mechanism most appropriate to their situation;

· Present three possible types of mechanism, with incrementally greater levels of external engagement;

· Set out various ways in which global headquarters of companies can develop ‘group-wide procedures’ to support best practice locally.

The main audience for the guidance is ICMM’s members and other interested companies in the mining industry.

As practice in this space continues to evolve, particularly through the work of John Ruggie as part of his second mandate to the UN and practitioners such as the Compliance Advisor Ombudsman (CAO) for IFC and MIGA, this guide is released as a ‘Pilot Testing’ version. The intention is that ICMM: (i) apply the approaches outlined in-country over the next 12-18 months through its member companies; (ii) capture emerging lessons learned from the piloting process; and (iii) review and update the pilot testing version.

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