Message from the Chief Executive Officer
- Chip Goodyear
At BHP Billiton we recognise that integrating sound principles governing safety, business conduct, social, environmental and economic activities into business practice is both good for society and good for our business. Excellence in these areas provides the opportunity for competitive advantage and the development of a reputation as the partner of choice. Our objective is to earn and maintain this reputation.
During the past year, we have achieved very strong outcomes against our operating and health, safety, environmental and community (HSEC) targets. On behalf of the Board and the management team, I extend my thanks to not only our employees and contractors but also their spouses, partners and families for helping our company to achieve these results. The nature of our business means it takes a strong team effort to achieve our goals, and we recognise and greatly value this support.
In my message to you last year I reported with great sadness that seventeen of our employees or contractors lost their lives while at work. Evaluation of these events, as well as of all other accidents and incidents, indicated that we do not need fundamentally new systems. What we must do is improve our operating discipline by ensuring that the systems we have are followed and understood by all and that we learn from our experiences and share these across the organisation.
I am very pleased to report that strong progress has been made in this regard. We have identified desirable HSEC leadership attributes for line managers and strong performance in this area is now a prerequisite for promotion. Our Fatal Risk Control Protocols have been implemented and we continue to focus on the importance of sharing knowledge. Despite our efforts, however, three of our colleagues lost their lives at work during this fiscal year. All of us are affected by these events and by the impact on family, friends and associates. It makes our resolve even stronger to provide a workplace that consistently delivers Zero Harm — we will not be satisfied until we achieve this objective.
From an environmental perspective, we maintained our progress in reducing the greenhouse intensity of our operations. Since establishing our current five-year reduction target to reduce the intensity of our production by five per cent, we have achieved a 10 per cent reduction. While water intensity reduced compared to last year, there is still an overall increase to date of five per cent against the 2001/02 baseline. In the year ahead, we will endeavour to improve performance in this area.
We continued to meet our commitment to spend one per cent of our pre-tax profit on a three year rolling average on community programs, contributing US$57.4 million to our local communities. In health we have been successful in reducing the number of new cases of occupational illness by 36 per cent when compared to the 2002/03 baseline.
In June 2005 we welcomed WMC Resources Ltd to the BHP Billiton Group and look forward to reporting on the activities of former WMC assets in future reports. We acknowledge the concerns of some stakeholders about the inclusion of uranium in our portfolio, and we will bring our strong product stewardship experience to this commodity as we have done with our other businesses. I also encourage you to read our position on uranium, available from our website.
Pleasingly, I can again report that we have received recognition for our performance in public reporting, community relationships and sustainable development. We are particularly proud to have been selected as the ‘Company of the Year’ at the Business in the Community Awards in the UK. These are the premier awards in the UK that support and encourage corporate social responsibility. We are the first company in the extractive industries to receive the award and are the first recipient acknowledged for its global activities.
Our Full Report on our website has again been prepared in accordance with the Global Reporting Initiative 2002 Sustainability Reporting Guidelines and represents a balanced and reasonable representation of our organisation’s economic, environmental and social performance. We remain committed to the UN Global Compact, and you can read an update on our progress against the Compact’s ten principles within this report.
During the year we revised our previous HSEC Policy, Management Standards and performance targets. As a result, our HSEC Policy was broadened to become our Sustainable Development Policy, which I believe marks the next step change in our approach to sustainable development.
I would welcome any feedback you have in relation to this report and look forward to reporting our progress again next year as we continue to focus on creating value for our shareholders and stakeholders.
Chip Goodyear
Chief Executive Officer
