Resilience Environmental Assurance approved to conduct IRMA audits – IRMA

The Initiative for Responsible Mining Assurance (IRMA) is pleased to announce that South Africa-based Resilience  Environmental Assurance (REA) is now approved to conduct independent assessments of mining operations against the IRMA Standard for Responsible Mining. Resilience joins KPMG PRI, ERM CVS and SCS Global Services to become the fourth IRMA approved audit firm.

Resilience will transparently and independently audit those mining operations which volunteer to be assessed against the 26 chapters and 400+ requirements of the IRMA Standard. Audit firms announce their assessments in advance so that assessors can interview not just mine management, but also affected community members and mine workers (among others).

“The addition of Resilience as an approved audit firm underscores IRMA’s commitment to answering the increasing demand for responsibly sourced minerals.” — Aimee Boulanger, Executive Director of IRMA.

Resilience Environmental Assurance’s approval as an IRMA audit firm marks a pivotal step in our journey towards fostering responsible mining practices worldwide. This achievement underscores our unwavering commitment to environmental stewardship and social responsibility within the mining sector. As Managing Director, I am immensely proud of our team’s dedication and hard work in reaching this milestone. As a boutique firm, we are eager to leverage our deep local expertise, personalized service by our highly experienced team, agility, and global presence to conduct comprehensive, accurate, and independent assessments in support of responsible mining. Together with IRMA, we aim to drive transparency, accountability, and continuous improvement, paving the way for a more sustainable and ethical mining industry.” — Warrick Stewart, Managing Director,Resilience  Environmental Assurance.

IRMA is a system in three parts:

1. A global standard describing best practices for environmental and social responsibility, against which mines at any point in their journey to improve practices may be measured;
2. An assessment process to measure achievement of mining operations against that standard such that the process builds trust in the independence of that assessment, and value for more responsible practice; and
3. Equal governance and oversight by mining affected stakeholders such that communities, labor unions and other public sector representatives have the same voting power as mining companies and other private sector representatives.