ICMM has 23 members, comprising the world’s leading miners, and the new agreement binds its members to further improve mine tailings management throughout their global operations.

A review was initiated by ICMM in December last year, one month after the Samarco tailings dam failure that killed 19 people and left hundreds homeless in Brazil.

Golder Associates was appointed to report on surface tailings management guidance across the 23 member companies.

ICMM agreed with the findings of the Golder review, which included an increased emphasis on governance to ensure that the existing technical and management guidance is more effectively applied.

ICMM CEO Tom Butler said members were committed to driving safety and environmental improvements across the sector.

“After the tragic failure of the Samarco tailings dam, we had to determine how we could best help to minimise the risk of the recurrence of such a catastrophic event,” he said.
  
 “We were determined to take action at the global level and all of our member companies have adopted this new binding agreement.

“We hope that non-member companies will also consider adopting this framework in order to help enhance the whole industry’s performance.”

ICMM has issued a new position statement, which is binding for members, committing them to minimise the risk of catastrophic failures of tailings dams by adopting six key elements of management and governance.

The position statement has been unanimously endorsed by all CEOs of ICMM member companies.

ICMM’s members include Samarco 50% owner BHP Billiton, as well as Rio Tinto, Glencore, Anglo American, Barrick Gold, Mitsubishi Materials, South32, Goldcorp, Teck Resources, Newmont Mining, Sumitomo Metal Mining, Freeport McMoRan, AngloGold Ashanti, Lonmin, Areva, Polyus Gold, Codelco, Antofagasta, MMG, JX Nippon, Hydro, African Rainbow Minerals and Gold Fields.