MINING COMMUNITIES PERSPECTIVES ON

CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY IN GHANA.

A CASE STUDY OF:

TARKWA, KENYASE, DAAMAN, BOGOSO, AND NSUTA.

by

Corporate Social Responsibility Movement (CSRM)

In collaboration with

Friedrich Ebert Stiftung (FES)

INTRODUCTION

Organisations are established to serve specific purposes and fulfill designated missions. To this end they provide infrastructure resources and other necessary training to their employees to enable them to accomplish goals and objectives directed towards the mission. In a reciprocal way, employee of an organisation must be committed to the mission and goals and give unreservedly of themselves in order to attain these purposes. However organizations cannot count only on financial performance and internal structures to survive in this ever-changing scenario of global competition, but also have a responsibility to the various stakeholders especially the immediate communities.

Corporate Social Responsibility (hereafter CSR) has garnered increased attention in recent years and continues to be a front burner issue within the business community in the developed economies. While there is no universally accepted definition of the concept, there is however a consensus that it implies a demonstration of certain responsible behaviour on the part of governments and business toward society and the environment. One of the most referred to definition is by the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD) in the publication “Making Good Business Sense” co-authored by Holme and Watts (2000,p.10) “as the continuing commitment by business to behave ethically and to contribute to economic development while improving the quality of life of the workforce and their families as well as the local community and society at large” Despite the fact that CSR has received considerable research attention as a new paradigm of development in the developed world it is still remote on the development agenda of developing countries.

The Corporate Social Responsibility Movement (CSRM) is an advocacy based non-governmental organization (NGO) in Tema, which has been in existence for the past four years aimed at demanding the incorporation of social and environmental responsibility from corporate bodies and governmental institutions in their operations. For the past years CSRM have been working in collaboration with the Fedrich Ebert Stiftung (FES) and the media as major partners. Other environmentally oriented NGOs, such as Friends of the Earth, Water Resource Commission, Third World Network etc, and the Tema Municipal Assembly (TMA) are also partner in the advocacy process. For the past years CSRM have been working in collaboration with other stakeholders on issues of labour, environment and social justice within the Tema municipality with the restoration of the Chemu lagoon as a case studies through workshops, forum, dialogue and host of other strategies in the advocacy process.

Problem statement

Ghana mineral resources endowment makes it Africa second biggest producer of gold after South Africa. With the liberalization of the Ghanaian economy and the reforms in the mining sector .The merger of Ashanti Goldfields and Anglo Gold and the start of a new programme by the giant USA company Newmont to invest 450 millions dollars in gold mining in Ghana. For instance the mining sector contributed 56% of the total foreign direct investment (FDI) in 2003 for mine expansion, rehabilitation, new exploration and mine development (ISSER report, 2003). However the impact of this huge inflow of resources is not commensurate with the sectors contribution to the development of communities in which they operate. Labour intensive underground mining have been replace by capital intensive surface mining that has sent many employees out of work especially in the mining communities.

There has been growing public, community and other environmental NGOs concern over the environmental pollution, destruction of forest reserves, deprivation of the people of farm lands continuous incident of cyanide spillage in to waters bodies and host of other social cost that accompany surface mining in these mining communities. The behaviour of these companies lives much to be desired. The media has trumpeted these problems associated with the mine operations in recent time. The nation and the mining communities in particular have not benefited comparatively at all from the proceeds and the operations of these companies. They only extract the minerals, exploit the community, deprive them of their source of livelihood and then repatriate their profits and live the residents who are directly affected by the mines to wallow in abject poverty.

The declaration of “golden age of business” by the government of Ghana cannot be realised if the immediate communities, were corporate have their presence, feels alienated, abused and cheated. This will create tension between the communities and the companies, which would then affect the peaceful atmosphere required for their smooth operation in the community. The elusion of this social licence from the community to operate will also affect the realisation of the golden age of business dream. The believe that business can be separated from various community interest has been the order of development in the developing countries where businesses focus only on their profit to the detriment of the larger community interest.

Today, businesses are being asked to play vital role in addressing complex issues of poverty alleviation, environmental concerns, human and labour rights of indigenous people and even corruption. Even though the focus and operations of the CSRM have been on the restoration of the Chemu Lagoon in Tema .The happenings in the mining sector is a clear manifestation of poor corporate social responsibility. The quest by the CSRM to be a trail blazer on issues CSR as captured in the strategic plan “ We will raise critical issues on CSR, thoroughly research them and build the necessary knowledge resources, convene stakeholders to discuss the issues and find innovative solutions to them” has warranted their attention to look at the perception of the residents of this communities where this companies operate.

Aims and objectives.

It is against all these lob sided form of development that the CSRM in collaboration with the FES under took this research to come out with a comprehensive report on the issues on the ground from the very people who are mostly affected by the activities of these mining companies. In addition, the indicators of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), New Partnership for Africa Development (NEPAD), and the Global Compact, which Ghana is a signitory, have given rise to the need for a national policy that will harmonize aspects of CSR in the country. There is the need for a ready and authoritative document to support advocacy in the area of CSR. The perspectives of the mining communities on CSR is very crucial in the formulation of a national policy in Ghana since their day to day lives revolves around the activities of these companies, i.e. living with, working with and dealing with corporations. The study aimed at establishing:

• What in the experience of these mining communities CSR has been involved with. Some of the times corporate bodies decide on what to be given to the communities without adequate consultation of all the stakeholders. It is therefore important to establish whether consultations are done at all by the corporate bodies in their administration of social responsibility to the community.

• What aspects of CSR are emphasized and what aspect are de-emphasized, especially those communities that have Corporate Social Responsibility operating in their community and what they expect from those programmes.

• Lastly, Corporate Social Responsibility Movements (CSRM) agenda of leading the advocacy for the formulation and implementation of a national policy on corporate social responsibility in Ghana would be impossible if there are no objective data to back it. This research will generate enough data for such exercise.

Relevance of study

The relevance of this research cannot be over emphasized .It will not be of only academic exercise but practical as well if it is adopted by the mining companies and utilized. Dynamism of today’s world raises the usefulness of research, as organizations react to the changing environment by implementing fundamental and rapid reforms in their relationship with employees, community and other stakeholders. This research will bring to light the enormous problems and challenges facing the communities that these mining companies operate.

• The result of this research will go a long way to enhance the effective operation of the Corporate Social Responsibility in diverse ways in the country. Too often national policies are designed with limited or no input from those whose lives the policies are meant to improve. Incorporating the opinion of these mining communities in the formulation and implementation of CSR policy will enrich the policy as well. The study will address this concerns by ensuring that the voices of the people in these mining communities are heard and factor into the final policy. This will ensure that the communities set the agenda for the deliberations leading to the adoption of a national policy on CSR in Ghana.

• The final report will provide a handy document for the CSRM in its strategic advocacy process of championing the formulation and implementation of a national policy on corporate social responsibility in the country. It will also help other research bodies as well as other NGOs working in this area since it will serve as a reference material to enlighten their understanding of the issues of CSR in the mining sector of Ghana.

• In addition to the above, this research will also help district assembly and other national institution in their fight for the incorporation of CSR activities in corporate operations and if possible nib any potential conflict in the bud. That is to prevent the occurrence of conflict between the Ogoni tribe’s men of Nigeria and Royal Dutch Shell in Ghana, as a result of poor CSR practices, since the result of this study will bring to light the sentiments and expectations of these mining companies.

• No programme can be run without pause to evaluate its strength and weaknesses. More often than not, the evaluations of corporate social responsibility performance of these companies are measured by the checkbooks, thus how much monies they have contributed to the community. It is therefore important for such a research to seek the opinion of the target population who are directly affected by the CSR programmes.

• Research of this kind is very important for the continuous improvement of CSR programmes of the mining companies. It is believed that the result of this study will be Corporate Social Responsibility Movement (CSRM) contribution towards the evaluation of Corporate Social Responsibility of the mines. It will also serve as a feed back to these companies.

Methodology.

A combination of interview and, purposely constructed, questionnaire for the study were used for the data collection. The target population for this study was the permanent residents of the five mining communities namely, Tarkwa, Kenyasi, Daaman,Nsuta and Bogoso. Convenience-sampling methods was adopted in the data collection process in order to give room for equal representation of the total population.

A total of five hundred questionnaires were distributed in all, one hundred questionnaires in each of the five mining communities. Homes, markets, farms, street, bars of the participants were visited with the help of some opinion leaders in each community to respond to the questionnaires after the reasons of the study were explained to them to alley any fear and suspicions.

Even though five hundred (500) questionnaire were distributed in all the five communities only 420 were received representing 84% but 30 of the collected questionnaires was discarded because they were not properly answered or were not completed so only 390 was finally left for this research, which constitute 78% of the total questionnaires distributed. There were 234 females and 158 males representing 59.5% and 40.5%respectively. The other demographic data are presented on the tables A and B below representing educational background and age distribution respectively. It must be emphasized that the community were very sceptical about our mission and intention. In some situations an interpreter services was employed to help in explaining the purpose and also to translate the questions in to the local dialect.

Table A. below Representing the age distribution of the participants.

Table B below Representing educational background of participants.

Table B

Results and discussions

The findings of this research gives credence to the fact that the mining communities are not all that pleased with the operations of most mining companies within their respective community. There are also certain held perceptions and allegations by the community members that are not based on concrete facts. Even in a situation where the mines have a strong presence in the area of CSR the people are not appreciative of it and very skeptical. Some of the people expect more from the mines than even the central government.

The perception of these communities towards the social activities of the mining companies can best be described as the battles over environmental justice, human rights, the preservation of indigenous culture, the right to control development, and the need for a more equitable distribution of wealth. This has been the battle between the host communities and the mining companies.

The findings of the research indicate that almost all (92%)the residents in the communities expect a certain form of employment from the mining companies operating within their community. This perception is fuelled by the fact that the mines are operating on their land and therefore they are entitle to automatic employment and must be considered for employment first and foremost. However the research showed that most of the indigenous people within the community do not have the requisite skills, academic qualification and the required experience to man certain key positions in these companies.

For instance 82% of the respondents strongly agreed that the mines have not provided them with job therefore their presence in the community do not affect them positively. Some even accused the mines of betrayal. The betrayal accusation came up very strongly at the kenyase community were a new mine has been open by Newmont. For the residence the mines promised full time employment to all the youth in the community but this has eluded them and they have not been provided with any other source of livelihood since their land has been taken from them for the mines.

More than half of the total respondents, thus70%, strongly agreed to these questions “The mines has been a curse rather than a blessing to them” this gives a clear indication of poor corporate social responsibility prevailing in the mining communities. The reasons for the high expression of this negative sentiments towards the mining companies emanate from the fact that the activities of these mining companies are characterised with a lot of human right abuses, disagreements with local communities about access to land and pollution of water bodies etc which are so glaring in almost all the communities under study.

Education was found to be the leading issue that companies support with 284 of the respondents representing 73% agreed that the mining companies operating in their respective communities have one way or the other built schools for the local community as part of their social responsibility. Construction of class rooms, early child hood development centre, provision of desk and chairs for the various secondary schools, renovation and painting of class room blocks, implementation of scholarships schemes for deserving students, boreholes for potable drinking water to the community and extension of electrification to some communities.

Almost all the communities studied acknowledge the contributions of these social facilities by the mining companies; however, they expressed certain misgivings of these donations. . Some communities have been relocated, leading to longer walking to school for children. More than half of the respondents representing 53% agreed that they are not adequately consulted in the constructions and provisions these facilities, even if it benefit them at all, they should be consulted. On occasions when they are consulted at all, it is only the chiefs and other opinion leaders, but they who are mostly affected are not consulted even in the payment of compensation when their farms are destroyed. The communities are not pleased with this style of “giving back” to the community.

The perception of people in the community towards the mines corporate social profile cannot be described as very good or positive. These perceptions are fuelled by the negative impact of mining on their immediate surrounding, The results of this study is in conformity with the world Bank and the international Finance corporation (2002) findings that it is worthwhile for mining operations to set up environmental management systems because mines leave behind obvious environmental footprints “…at worst seriously limiting the ability of surrounding communities to earn and sustain their livelihood, especially in areas where communities rely on their natural environment to provide food,, shelter, transport and other opportunities”.

One important area that this research found to be interesting was that, most of the people have been given alternative source of livelihood in a form of poultry farm, rabbit and grass cutter rearing, fish farming and goat rearing. The rest include tie and die making, dress making and other related trades. But the women are the most beneficiaries of these trades, the men however, are not in to these trades since to them it is not financially rewarding and the returns are not as quick as the small-scale mining. The men prefer the illegal small-scale mining popularly known as “Galamsey”. It must be emphasised that the “galamsey” operators are also further marginalized as their access to gold fields is restricted and they are forced to seek other work or to open up new (previously forest) areas themselves which is causing high levels of land, air and water pollution.

Gender perspective.

With the new wave of gender advocacy in the country to end discrimination against women, this research would not be completed without looking at the effects of mining companies corporate social responsibility profile on the women front. The masculine nature of mining also raises serious social and financial issues facing the women in these communities. While the men finds jobs with the mining companies as labourers, the women are left out and forced out of the forest that provide them with food and medicine.

The mining companies in the research exhibited some degree of social responsibility to the women and the community by installing mills, constructing wells and developing lands for market gardening. In addition, they provided equipment to the women to aid in their “gari” processing and other activities. The findings of the research however make clear that, on balance, the economic, social and the cultural impacts of the companies activities as outlined above do not adequately compensate the women and the community for the adverse effects that they suffer.

Women are also the most affected by the closure of mines because there is no compensation, retraining and rehabilitation for them since the majority of them are of without adequate education and skills. The result of this research indicate that 65 % of women are in favour of the mines CSR profile, this is due to the benefits that they receive from some of the companies social programmes. Contrary, 35 % of the men are in favour of the mines corporate social performance profile. It is not out of place that women have a positive perception of the mines CSR, even though they are affected mostly by the operations of the mines they also turn to benefit more from most of the alternative livelihood programmes put in place by these companies.

In reality, women’s voice are silence through shyness, cultural prohibition and discrimination, the sentiments of these women can best be described frustration and anger towards the CSR profile of this mines, as one woman at Tarkwa captures it as “mining has nothing to offer women but violence, displacement, poverty and abuse of human rights”. The expression by these women is the total embodiment of how the communities view the operations of these mining companies. For instance 68% the respondents agreed strongly to the importance of corporate social responsibility as a good gesture that will also help in the peaceful coexistence of the mining companies. However they have negative attitudes towards the operations of the mines and also mistrust them because most of the mining companies have not redeem most of their promises to them.

These promises are not new to the villagers and the public as a whole, as one woman in the Bogoso town described it. “We have heard all this things before. They came with all sorts of promises, but we saw nothing. They devastated our lands and livelihoods and showed little respect for civil rights. Our villages have already been so rapaciously deforested by mining, and the health and the quality of remaining forests continue to decline, and now they are asking for the forest reserves; do they think Ghanaians wash their faces from their chin upwards?” This is a clear indication of mistrust between the mines and the communities.

HIV/AIDS has also made a significant impact on communities in general and women in particular. Through the masculine nature of mining, the industry has a high number of male migrant workers. Most of the mining companies have responded to this pandemic in some form of campaign, condom distribution and treatment at hospitals. The concerns of the women are that even though the mining companies have social programmes in the form of condom distribution and HIV awareness campaign to fight the pandemic they are not enough and more often than not their focus are not really on the women and the community in general but rather the employees working with the mines.

The current status of CSR in Ghana cannot be described as very good. Evidence of poor CSR practices are so glaring in the villages this is reveal in the general level of poverty and under development in the communities where corporate operate. The mining sector has not provided enough employment because the labour-intensive underground mines have been replaced by capital-intensive surface mining and this has sent many employees out of work. At the same time mining has cause high unemployment in surrounding communities by taking away large tracts of land from farmers and not providing enough jobs to make up for the number of people laid off from agriculture. This is evidence in the high rate of unemployment in the mining communities.

Residents who were evacuated as a result of the mines operation and new houses have been built for them as compensation complains vehemently that they are not pleased because the building are too small for them and their families. In situation were the villagers have refused evacuation the police have been called in to brutalised them. The reaction of the community can best be described as a mix feeling because some of them see the buildings as a blessing and others a curse and a cheat. The dislocation have affected every aspect of the their social fabric.

Another important findings of this research are the poor environmental monitoring structures in the country. Because there is no national policy on CSR to guide the operations of these mining companies in their interaction with the community, Most of the activities of these corporate bodies are based on discretion with support from very few opinion leaders and chiefs. The strength of this multinationals cannot be ruled out completely in the poor CSR profile in the country. The governments declaration of golden age of business would not be realized without foreign direct investment, in view of this, most laws governing the environment are relaxed in order to allow the mining companies to invest in the country. The companies have also unleashed a barrage of promising propaganda and have pledged material aid to persuade the public and the communities.

Air and water pollution stemming from mining operations in Tarkwa, bogoso and Nsuta have spread malaria, tuberculosis, silicosis, acute conjunctivitis and other skin diseases. These were some of the complaints of the people but it goes beyond the verification by the researchers to established causation. Care should therefore be taken in establishing causation. However there is enough evidence of cyanide spillage in to water bodies. The mines use cyanide heap leach technology, which involves spraying cyanide on ore to extract gold. The liners and dams used to hold the cyanide in tend to leak and some times even fail completely, for instance a spillage at teberebie Goldfields sent millions of cyanide solution in to the Angonaben stream, a tributary of the Bonsa River. There is an evidence of these poor environmental practices in all the communities under study.

Conclusions.

The study examines five mining communities perspectives on corporate social responsibility. One of the legacies of these surface mining activities is the almost permanent thick cloud of dust that hangs over the town as result of dust from mining, ore transporting, crushing and milling activities. The liberalisation of the economy and the reforms in the mining sector in particular is a clear indication that the effect of mining will be with this country for many years to come. The research indicates that for effective and peaceful collaboration and coexistence the mining companies have to improve on their social responsibility performance and give more to their immediate communities.

The result of the research shows that the residents of the communities have a positive view of corporate social responsibility since it helps alleviate some of their problems. However the communities have a negative perception of the mines implementation of these social programmes because is no adequate consultation. Some communities have been relocated, leading to longer walking to school for children. The loss of parents and especially women’s income generating activities have led to a number a number of girl children having to drop out of school to serve as a house help in mining settlements in order to support family incomes. Women are the most affected but they also turn to benefit more from some of the social programmes put in place by the mines than the men. The result further pointed to the fact that both the males and the females agreed that the compensation does not commensurate with the effect that the mines have afflicted on them.

The result indicate that there is no national frame work on corporate social responsibility to guide the social activities of the mines, a divide and rule style is used in the administration of CSR programmes, where the mining companies operate with the support of few opinion leaders and the chiefs without adequate consultation of the general population and other stakeholders. There is therefore the need for adequate consultations of all stakeholders if the mines want to succeed.

The communities, NGOs, governmental institutions are not adequately resourced with the adequate skills and capacity to demand the necessary compensation from the mining companies. Government must put measures in place to educate and build the capacity of state institutions and other stakeholder to demand social responsibility from not only mining companies but also, all corporations. Awards schemes should therefore be institute to motivate companies that are doing well in this area. The club one hundred selection criteria should be revise to include corporate social responsibility.