Newmont Corporation (NYSE: NEM, TSX: NGT): The World’s Leading Gold Company, Establishing a $20 Million Community Support Fund; Interview with Steve Gottesfeld, Executive Vice President and Chief Sustainability and External Affairs Officer
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By Dr. Allen Alper, PhD Economic Geology and Petrology, Columbia University, NYC, USA
on 4/23/2020
Newmont Corporation (NYSE: NEM, TSX: NGT) is the world’s leading gold company and a producer of copper, silver, zinc and lead. Newmont’s world-class portfolio of assets, prospects and talent is anchored in favorable mining jurisdictions, in North America, South America, Australia and Africa. We learned from Steve Gottesfeld, who is Executive Vice President and Chief Sustainability and External Affairs Officer at Newmont, that they have established a $20 million Community Support Fund to help host communities, governments and employees combat the COVID-19 pandemic in the areas of Newmont's operations.
Peñasquito, Mexico
Dr. Allen Alper: This is Dr. Allen Alper, Editor-In-Chief of Metals News, talking with Steve Gottesfeld, who is Newmont’s Executive Vice President and Chief Sustainability and External Affairs Officer.
Could you tell our readers/investors about Newmont establishing a 20 million Community Support Fund in this time of global pandemic?
Steve Gottesfeld: Absolutely, Dr. Alper. I appreciate your interest. The pandemic, while it is global and impacting everyone, it impacts different communities differently, based on their level of capacity to be able to deal with the problem.
The health and safety of our people and host communities is paramount, which is why Newmont proactively took aggressive steps to prevent transmission of the Coronavirus through a number of controls at and around all of our sites, globally. Those controls included:
Cancelling all non-essential travel; Closing our offices and implementing remote work arrangements wherever possible; Enhancing temperature and questionnaire screening at entry points to our sites; Strict physical distancing protocols and suspension of in-door gatherings; Increased frequency of deep cleaning and sanitization of surfaces; Providing hygiene and health support to nearby communities where our employees and contractors live and work; and Proactively ramping down certain operations to reduce the risk of transmission to nearby communities with limited health care capacity.
At this time, we have no confirmed cases of COVID-19 at our sites, and we are working around the clock to try and keep it that way.
Newmont has 12 operations in eight different countries, so we really need to understand those impacts in the locations of our operations, the communities around them, and the challenges that are unique to them.
In talking with our regional operations leaders, we came to focus on three areas of support; employee and community health, food security, and local economic resilience. When we talk about local economic resilience, we're talking about the ability of the businesses in our local communities, near the mines, to be able to survive the challenges that are brought on by the pandemic. Also how to help local suppliers, who provide services and goods to our operations, weather through this.
Most of our operations are continuing to produce, while others are operating, at the moment, at restricted levels or under care and maintenance; as a result, it's having different impacts on those local suppliers. So we need to take that into account to understand how to help them go through this process and take care of their employees; so that when we come out of this, they're able to continue to support the operations and those local economies will be able to continue to thrive.
Another important way we are supporting host communities beyond the Community Fund is our commitment to compensate our employees at full pay for at least the months of April, May and June regardless of the status of our operations or their ability to conduct work. This will reduce the pressure on our employees, their families and host communities, while helping to ensure our collective resiliency to emerge well from this pandemic.
Éléonore, Quebec
Dr. Allen Alper: Well, that sounds great. It shows how Newmont has such great foresight and understanding and is willing to support their people and the local communities and their suppliers. That's excellent!
Steve Gottesfeld: Thank you.
Dr. Allen Alper: Could you tell us a little bit more about the $20 million Community Support Program?
Steve Gottesfeld: Sure. We've made assessments based on those three focus areas, and focused on how to address the needs of specific communities and challenges around our sites. We tried to estimate the amount we felt would meet the near to medium challenges in those communities with the pandemic. We determined an amount that we felt was both meaningful and appropriate for addressing those critical needs.
We will continue to make assessments based on those challenges and the progression of the pandemic. We are hopeful that by taking the right actions, by doing the right levels of hygiene and protection and education that we will be able to keep people safe through this work. Of course, we will continue to assess the needs of those communities as we go through this process.
Dr. Allen Alper: Well that sounds excellent. I wonder if you could tell our readers/investors a bit about Newmont’s operations around the globe. I'm sure they all have heard of Newmont, but give them more insight into some of your operations, where they're located and what's going on there?
Steve Gottesfeld: So, we have 12 operations in eight different countries. We have several operations in Canada. We have one here in Colorado, where we're also headquartered. We have a large operation in the state of Zacatecas in Mexico, and an operation in Suriname. In addition, we have an operation in Peru called Yanacocha, and Cerro Negro in Argentina. In addition to that, we have two operations in Ghana and two operations in Australia.
Cerro Negro, Argentina
At this time, seven of our mines are operating at more or less normal capacity, while five are operating at restricted output or are on care and maintenance. Two of those are in Canada, our operation in Argentina, our operation in Peru, as well as the recent ramp down of our operation in Mexico.
Dr. Allen Alper: Could you tell our readers/investors, what you think will happen with gold and other minerals as we move out of this pandemic, as the world recovers?
Steve Gottesfeld: We've seen significant movement in the price of gold over the last month, but the reality is that there had been significant movement in the price of gold prior to the pandemic. The pandemic and the responses to the pandemic, especially if you look at what is happening with regard to both monetary and fiscal policy, bodes very well for longer term gold prices. When you look at the amount of quantitative easing, lower interest rates and fiscal stimulus, all of that points to gold price strength going forward.
Dr. Allen Alper: Is there anything else you'd like to tell our readers/investors?
Tanami, Australia
Steve Gottesfeld: Above all else, our focus is on the health and safety of our workforce and the communities around us. All the decisions we are making at our operations are done through that lens. So with that filter, we will assess all of our actions and activities going forward, as we work through this process.
Dr. Allen Alper: I want to thank you, Steve, and Newmont, for being such responsible community leaders and helping your employees and the community. That's excellent!
Steve Gottesfeld: Well, Dr. Alper, I really appreciate your interest in what we're doing and in helping us to get the message out and helping people understand how we work and our focus during this difficult time.
Dr. Allen Alper: I enjoyed talking with you. I think all Newmont people can be very proud of their Company.
Steve Gottesfeld: Thank you. I really appreciate it. Remain well.
Dr. Allen Alper: You too, and have an excellent day. We’ll publish your press releases as they come out so our readers/investors can follow your progress.
https://www.newmont.com
Investor Contact
Jessica Largent
303.837.5484
jessica.largent@newmont.com
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