Product stewardship

Overview

Product stewardship relates to understanding the life cycle of the metals and minerals we produce.  In other words, we are overseeing the safe production, use and disposal of metal and minerals products as society continues to need them.

We recognise that producers have both individual and joint responsibility - with other stakeholders -  to ensure that products are managed safely across their life cycles. 

Our product stewardship work is allowing us to emerge as one of the industry leaders in this field. And the ensuing enhancement of our reputation worldwide is improving our access to markets and thus, our licence to operate.

How we manage the use of our products

We strive to improve our understanding of the health, safety and environmental implications of the use of our products.   In 2006, we put in place measures to ensure that our products were produced and used in a responsible manner, as well as disposed of appropriately at the end of their lives.

Our product stewardship strategy now emphasises the importance of understanding threats and opportunities in the market, and the importance of engagement with key stakeholders including customers, suppliers, regulators and communities.

This engagement also enables us to provide relevant data for the development of new product related legislation  - for example, the EU directive: Registration, Evaluation and Authorisation of Chemicals (REACH).

Our results

In 2006, 90 per cent of businesses reported either being in the process of developing or had already established a formal product stewardship programme, with 43 per cent of businesses reporting an improvement in status. 

Six businesses reported that they had completed life cycle assessments on all of their key products, and eight businesses implemented or made positive improvements to their product impact assessment programmes.  These results represent significant improvement over 2005, and demonstrate that product stewardship is being incorporated into business planning.