Globalisation, the financial crisis, risk-management priorities and a greater awareness of the business benefits of beyond-compliance strategies are driving companies from a business-as-usual approach into the arms of proactive and sustainable thinking.
While current beyond-compliance strategies that focus on meeting international standards do not always make business sense, it is becoming increasingly difficult for companies to justify turning a blind eye to this new business imperative.
Africa, in particular, looks poised to benefit from this new business mind-set.
Recent research by Prof. Stuart L Hart at Cornell University in the United States shows that the financial and other payoffs of beyond-compliance sustainability activities – which he terms ‘higher-order’ activities – substantially outweigh traditional ‘lower-order’ strategies.
Full article by Donald Gibson in the July edition of Mining Prospectus
