As our business operates in many remote, poor areas, which is ironically where gold is found the majority of the time, our community development and CSR managers travel extensively to these locations and complete planning and implementation programs to define how best the local economic can be improved through infrastructure development. A series of these trips showed that by providing Internet access throughout the local libraries, high school graduate rates increased by over 60%.
The compound effects of this initial investment in infrastructure also led to greater job creation and a more eclectic mix of professions. With greater knowledge flowing throughout the communities, many who had given up on education and jobs were re-invigorated....
Gold mining communities tend to attract contract workers and their families that live from boom to bust, and almost become nomadic over time. By investing in the infrastructure of the community to accentuate learning, our company wants to help these companies break the cycle of a nomadic existence, constantly following the next big gold rush or boom town. In speaking with our community development managers, it is clear that the stabilizing of a community will make for a much more effective workforce over the long-term and give employees and contractors a chance to fully benefit from the gold mining and its continual value escalation on the markets of the world. This is the vision of our organization, one that galvanizes all efforts together.
