In his office at the top of the great red slab of building that houses the pellet plant, Tayfun Eldem, GM Product Manufacturing, is at the sharp end of that improvement in productivity.

"Technically, pelletizing is the most complex process within Rio Tinto iron ore operations. But while there are improvements to be made by investing capital in the process, getting the maximum out of here is much more people dependent. Sustaining output is heavily people based, getting more out of the same asset base with a performance based approach.

"The common thread in this approach is leaders. I look for fully rounded leaders who are results oriented with a strong appetite to break the norm and challenge the status quo. Good coaches, they've got to be strong team players, both as leaders of teams and as members of the leadership team, and have appropriate technical knowledge and the ability to manage multiple processes - safety, production, quality and cost performance.

"Pumping 13 million tonnes of pellets out of here is something we can all be proud of, especially since every IOC employee will stand behind quality, not just pushing volume."

Just up the road from the administration offices, Canada geese have a favourite place, the gentle slopes of the tailings, where they graze the variety of grasses and crops introduced by IOC's tailing management programme. It's tangible evidence of the work overseen by the teams managed by Phil Turner, GM Environment, Safety and Health.

"Our annual tailings rehabilitation and revegetation programme is our biggest business challenge," he says. "We are in the process of changing our discharge method to one that instead of discharging effluent containing fine particles which discolour the water, a flocculent is used to sink the particles to the bottom of a deep trench within the lake. This allows us to minimize our impact to a small portion of the impoundment and restore the ecological and recreational values of Wabush Lake.