Socio-economic assessment toolbox (SEAT)
Positive engagement with host communities can't rely on good intentions alone. To make sure a company's presence accords with your neighbours' own aspirations and best interests, you need an effective process to help create and implement your sustainable development policies. Anglo American's Socio-Economic Assessment Toolbox (SEAT) does just that.
Students at Huachunta shcool near Anglo Base Metals' Quellaveco copper project in Peru
Launched in 2003 and enhanced in 2007, SEAT is in place at 60 Anglo American sites in 16 countries from Australia to Zimbabwe. Its key steps include:
- profiling our own operations and our host community
- identifying and engaging with key stakeholders
- assessing the impacts of our operations - both positive and negative - and the community's key socio-economic development needs
- developing a management plan to mitigate any negative aspects of our presence and to make the most of the benefits our operations bring
- working with stakeholders and communities to help address some of their broader development challenges they would face even without our presence
- producing a report with stakeholders to form the basis for ongoing engagement with and support for the community
The Group CEO Cynthia Carroll has deemed this so valuable that, in line with SEAT best practice, each of our significant operations runs a new assessment every three years.
And every year we train more senior managers and NGO partners on how to make the most of SEAT. In 2007, for instance over 200 people participated in five SEAT workshops in Australia, Brazil, Peru and South Africa. To date, 420 managers have been trained on the most recently updated methodology.
A history of success
In five years, the use of SEAT has resulted in the launch of a wide range of community initiatives in education, training and local enterprise development. It has also had a positive impact on handling issues such as housing, transport, recruitment and HIV/AIDS.
To discover the positive impact of some of Anglo American's SEAT projects, click on the case studies below:
Third party plaudits
A number of external organisations have provided positive feedback on SEAT:
Business for Social Responsibility (BSR)
Leading American NGO Business for Social Responsibility (BSR) found
SEAT to be "an international best practice". BSR chief executive
Aron Cramer noted:
"SEAT helps Anglo American's operations to achieve their social licence to operate consistent with the expectations of stakeholders and broader society. It is underpinned by Anglo American's decades of experience operating in and contributing to emerging economies throughout Africa, Eastern Europe and Latin and South America.
"The toolkit represents one of the most significant corporate investments we know of to equip personnel to better understand, plan, implement and account for the social and economic performance at the local operations level."
Article 13 and CBI Case Study Series: Anglo
American plc – revisited
In December 2007, SEAT was featured in a case study series by the
UK's
Confederation of Business Industry (CBI) and
strategic corporate social responsibility (CSR) advisors
Article 13 which teamed up to profile
companies doing innovative work in CSR and from whom CBI members
can learn.
Cambridge University's Judge Business
School
Academics at Cambridge University's Judge Business School noted
that SEAT "is revolutionising Anglo American's relationship with
its operations' neighbouring communities..."
UK Charity Aid Foundation
Another commendation for SEAT came from the UK Charity Aid
Foundation, which says it is "both innovative, positioning
stakeholder engagement at its central core, and replicable".
Anglo American is sharing the acclaimed first version of SEAT with other companies in the mining sector and beyond to foster better social engagement elsewhere.
SEAT2 was launched in 2007, with more than 20 sites commencing SEAT studies in 2008.
