The economic recovery continued in 2010, with strong demand for a number of metals, including copper, gold and silver, all of which are important to Boliden. Global demand for base metals is primarily influenced by fast-growth, high population economies, such as China and Brazil, and a number of other countries in Asia and South America, but demand has also gradually improved in Europe and North America. Much of Boliden's work over the past year has involved completing a number of expansion projects, improving the quality and productivity of our internal processes, and increasing the focus on our sustainability work.
Prioritising our sustainability work
Our mines and smelters have a wide-ranging sphere of influence and effects – both positive and negative – and our ability to carry out genuine and relevant sustainability work demands that we prioritise certain areas. Choosing the sustainability challenges in which we invest our resources is an ongoing process. The key element in all of our most prioritised issues is that they have a direct impact on our success and a significant impact on our stakeholders.
We prioritise issues that we can control and that are, at the same time, fundamental to our ability to operate. This approach helps us to set relevant goals, to communicate them and, in the meanwhile, identify ways of further improving what we do. This Sustainability Report is one way in which we can clarify our priorities.
Dialogue for increased responsibility
Metals are the basis of technological and industrial development and are fundamental to most things that have improved standards of living worldwide. We all take for granted that metals will be produced but, at the same time, it is vital that we limit the negative effects that their production can have on people and the environment. Legislation and international regulations are becoming ever more stringent with regard to corporate responsibility, and are helping to push development forward, but Boliden's ambition is to go beyond legislative and regulatory requirements. Engaging in dialogues with customers, suppliers and other players in order to bring about improvements on an industrywide scale is fundamental to this kind of proactive work. One step in this process involves working with evaluations and audits, and 2010 saw Boliden launch a system designed to map our commercial partners' sustainability work. We believe that gaining a good insight into how our commercial partners work will also help us to give an account of how we approach certain issues. A self-assessment test is now available through Boliden's website, with questions about the work environment, external environment and anti-corruption work, among other things. We also intend to conduct targeted audits with the aim of obtaining an objective view of the responses.
New Boliden Way improves safety,the environment and productivity
Work on the introduction of the New Boliden Way (NBW), our organisational and production philosophy that aims to generate continuous improvement, continued in 2010. Production stability and productivity have gradually improved and we believe that this trend is both a lasting one and proof that NBW is beginning to become established as a long-term method of managing and running Boliden.
The Kokkola smelter has been working with NBW for longer than any other unit. The smelter has seen a continuous improvement in productivity for some time now – and this trend has been further boosted by NBW. We have also concluded the pilot project at the Kristineberg mine and NBW is now being implemented at all of our smelters and mines.
Our sustainability work is a natural component of NBW and means, among other things, that we work according to the principle that if small incidents are eliminated through a day-to-day awareness of safety and environmental issues, then major problems will also be handled more efficiently.
Focusing on increased safety...
Boliden operates in an industry that has to address major environmental and safety issues, and our safety and environmental work must always be a top priority. Stable production processes are, perhaps, the most important prerequisite of high safety standards and quality environmental performance. When production can run without interruption and maintenance work is carried out using well-prepared maintenance processes, improvised measures which entail the greatest risk of accidents, can be minimised.
Establishing accident-free workplaces is one of the most important challenges we face. Substantial improvements in the work environment have been made over the years, both in the international mining and smelting industry as a whole, and within Boliden, and as a result, accident rates have been falling for a number of years now. We are investing in solutions that yield high levels of safety, but at the same time, we know that the most important thing is now – and will continue to be – our work on attitudes and behaviour. Our efforts to strengthen the safety culture within our operations are being continuously and systematically developed with the aim of preventing and identifying risks and risky behaviour in our workplaces. Safety is always the first item on the agenda at meetings, conferences and Board Meetings.
...reduced emissions and discharges...
Our priorities in the environmental sphere are reducing discharges into water and emissions into air and improving waste management. We are developing new methods and methodologies and investing in our processes, all with the aim of reducing our environmental impact. We work actively with our energy management, with regard not only to enhancing the efficiency of our energy usage, but with examining energy from a range of different sources. The basic principle governing our processing of production-related waste is to extract as much as possible from the material with which we are working, either in our own or in other companies' facilities, with the aim of ensuring that we send as little final waste to landfill as possible. Boliden has, for many years now, been one of the world's biggest recyclers of electronic scrap and we are currently investing SEK 1.3 billion in increased recycling capacity at the Rönnskär copper smelter. This investment will make Boliden a world leader in this field – something that is not only profitable, but which is of huge benefit to society.
...and employee development
Boliden is on the threshold of a major generation shift and we are working on securing our future skill supply. Our ambition is for Boliden to achieve increased diversity with regard to gender, age and culture. Retaining skilled and experienced employees, while simultaneously reinforcing the organisation with new talent, is vital to our continued success. A number of programmes and projects are now in progress with the dual aim of developing our employees and making Boliden a more attractive employer. It is vital that both existing and potential employees understand the exciting areas in which Boliden operates: not only do we work with advanced production techniques, finance and technology, we also employ cutting edge competence in the fields of geology, metallurgy, chemistry, and environmental technology, and are constantly conducting financial and political assessments on a global scale.
Our improvement work is continuing, ensuring a balance is maintained between economic returns and a long-term approach to sustainability in every aspect of our operations. We see no conflict between profitability, safety and the environment; rather, we are building a corporate culture with long-term strength and which places real emphasis on these three areas. Boliden is, in partnership with our committed workforce, well-positioned to meet the challenges of both today and tomorrow.
Stockholm, March 2011
Lennart Evrell
President & CEO