HIV/AIDS is one of the most significant business and humanitarian issues facing companies with operations in southern Africa.
In the 1990s, Anglo American was one of the first companies to develop a comprehensive strategy to seek to minimise infection amongst its employees through prevention initiatives aimed at education and awareness, combating denial and stigma, conducting large-scale anonymous HIV prevalence surveys and the encouragement of individual voluntary counselling and testing for HIV.
Anglo American has always recognised, however, that the infection cannot be combated within the confines of an individual operation. The company has given a high priority to working with local communities on projects to:
- widen awareness
- encourage condom use, including amongst sex workers
- promote treatment of sexually transmitted diseases
- involve traditional healers in combating the epidemic; and
- create income-generating schemes that provide women, in particular, with the means to alleviate poverty.
Anglo American's pioneering work in the field of policy and advocacy on HIV/AIDS was recognised in 2001 by a Commonwealth award.
