Diversified miner Anglo American’s copper operations in Chile – the Los Bronces and El Soldado mines and the Chagres smelter – have been awarded the Copper Mark in recognition of responsible copper production practices.

The Copper Mark framework has been developed to demonstrate the copper industry’s commitment to the green energy transition and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.

“Consumers around the world are understandably expecting the products they buy to be made from metals and minerals that are responsibly sourced, meeting the highest ethical and sustainability standards. As an established sustainability leader, Anglo American’s alignment with the Copper Mark framework is part of our Sustainable Mining Plan commitment to assure all our operations against a recognised responsible mining standard by 2025,” said Anglo American Chile CEO Aaron Puna.

“The Copper Mark assurance process has provided us with a valuable opportunity to measure our performance at our operations in Chile against international best practice on a wide range of environmental and societal factors. We are immensely proud of the work our team has been doing across the board to ensure we meet our stakeholders’ expectations of Anglo American as a responsible mining company.”

The process of assessing Los Bronces, El Soldado and Chagres against the Copper Mark’s assurance process began in late 2021. The sites were assessed against 32 different criteria, including environmental risk management, energy consumption, waste and tailings management, mine closure and reclamation, occupational health and safety, business integrity, community and stakeholder engagement, human rights and cultural heritage.

The Copper Mark was developed following a consultation process with more than 100 different individuals and organisations, including mining companies, customers and the ultimate downstream users of mined products as well as NGOs. The Copper Mark aims to increase transparency in copper supply chains, allowing customers to be confident that their copper was produced responsibly and enabling them to track a copper product throughout the supply chain.