SDG Alignment

Our journey towards supporting and incorporating the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

Anglo American in South Africa is a business that already makes significant contributions to the SDGs through our mature sustainability approach, and a portfolio activities that span all levels of our business, namely workplace, operations, community, supply chain and partnerships. We are well positioned to play a greater role in South Africa’s achievement of the SDGs as we implement our Sustainable Mining Plan (SMP). Informed by the SDGs, our Sustainable Mining Plan sets a vision for 2030 with clear targets that will re-imagine mining to improve people's lives. We are recognized as leaders for how the SDGs are integrated into strategy through their alignment with our SMP and how a data-led narrative is shared in accountability dialogues with stakeholders.

The UN SDG’s

How our SDG programme is structured

Due to the mainstreaming of ESG considerations, we have seen an increase in scrutiny from various stakeholders in how the private sector is incorporating sustainability into core business but also in how business shares that journey. When we began our SDG journey these considerations touched on issues of strategy, disclosure and accountability. Now we are seeing that scrutiny also ask questions of meaningfully disclosing SDG performance, supporting innovation and investing in partnerships for impact. The private sector response to the SDGs is ramping up and is set to get more attention given the role of business in addressing socio-economic fault lines opened by the COVID-19 pandemic.

As such, the current landscape of expectations on SDG action have prompted us to expand our approach beyond simply mapping our activities to the SDGs and then sharing that in Accountability Dialogues. In 2021 we have thus expanded the scope of our SDG programme to include collaborative efforts, most notably in partnership with the United Nations Country Team in support of the new UN Sustainable Development Cooperation Framework (UNSDCF) with Government.

How our Sustainable Mining Plan will amplify our contributions

Our Sustainable Mining Plan brings into sharp focus a set of 13 SDGs that, through the implementation of the nine Stretch Goals, will ensure that Anglo American in South Africa contributes strongly to specific SDG targets between now and 2030.

The Stretch Goals and the nature of the interventions within each are then in turn directly related to 33 of the 169 SDG Targets.

Our SDG footprint and performance metrics

Our footprint is spread across 17 of the SDGs and as is typical with the SDG mapping of large business, our spend and activities link strongly to a small set of SDGs that in turn have knock on effects in relation to other interconnected SDGs. In 2020, the mapping identified R86.4 billion being directed towards SDG-linked activities. As can be expected of a large corporate entity (see the spend pyramid below), we make the largest contributions to decent work and economic growth, while also responding to the socio-economic development needs of our host communities and regional contexts – including our activities in the context of mine community development.

The 5Ps

The 5Ps – people, prosperity, planet, peace, partnerships – demonstrate that the SDGs cannot be approached in silos, but as an intertwined framework – with progress on one balancing and supporting another. The percentages across the 5Ps are expressed according to total spend in 2020 and show that Anglo American in South Africa is making a significant contribution to the building of a prosperous South Africa.

Accountability Dialogues

Our Trusted Corporate Leader pillar sets a stretch goal of increasing national and local accountability, whereby stakeholder accountability forums need to be established by 2020. In fulfillment of this, Anglo American in South Africa launched the SDG Accountability Dialogue Series in November 2018 as an accountability-based conversation with key stakeholders around how we measure our footprint against the SDGs through the implementation of our Sustainable Mining Plan.

Anglo American in South Africa SDG Accountability Dialogue 2019

Anglo American in South Africa SDG Accountability Dialogue 2020 (Virtual)

Working with government: Voluntary National Review (VNR)

In July 2019, South Africa presented a Voluntary National Review (VNR) to the UN’s High Level Political Forum in New York. In conjunction with the Global Compact Network SA, Anglo American submitted a case study on how we are aligning to the SDGs through the implementation of the Sustainable Mining Plan in South Africa

VNR Case Study

Transformation has a special meaning in South Africa. It means changing who we are at the most elemental level – thinking about and doing our work in entirely new ways. For Anglo American, transformation is a way of building a more just and equitable South Africa, taking into account South Africa’s difficult history of inequality and exclusion.

The 2020 South Africa Transformation Performance report provides an overview of our transformation progress and includes our performance against the Broad-Based Black Socio-Economic.

Download full PDF

Anglo American South Africa SDG Call to Action

Anglo American in South Africa’s case study was profiled first in the report amongst other high-profile organisations who are also leading the way in terms of SDG alignment, highlighting the leadership position we hold in how private sector players are responding to the SDGs.

How the SDGs are stimulating innovation in Anglo American

Young SDG Innovators Programme

The Young SDG Innovators Programme (YSIP) is led by the UN Global Compact and it activates future business leaders and change-makers to rethink their companies' business models by guiding them through a series of action learning workshops and activities. The participants in this 10-month programme focus on identifying opportunities and solutions that bridge the SDGs and innovation, in addition to addressing relevant challenges in their companies.

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SDG alignment

Our journey towards supporting and incorporating the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)​

The UN SDG’s​