Speciailty chemicals company Lanxess recently achieved one-million fatality-free shifts at its Rustenburg chrome mine. The last time this achievement was attained was in November 2012.

As a global company whose core business comprises the development, manufacture and sale of plastics, rubber, specialty chemicals and intermediates, Lanxess has always considered the safety of its employees as a top priority and has put in place various measures at all its sites worldwide to ensure employees internalise safety practices in and outside the workplace.

This milestone is attributed to systems in place at the mine, a dedicated workforce and a leader- ship team that recognises the importance of being exemplary as well as being part of a global com-pany that prioritises the safety of its employees.

The mine, with a workforce of about 1 500 employees, will continue engaging employees in several safety programmes in order to regularly communicate the importance of safety in the workplace, particularly in a mining environment.

“It is the dedication and commitment to safety practices in the workplace by employees that make a difference. Further, the leadership within the mine has to observe safety rules to the letter for employees to do the same,” says Lanxess Chrome Mining CEO Sarel Ferreira.

He notes that the mine subscribes to the principle of zero harm, adding that everyone who works at Lanxess in Rustenburg has the right to go home unharmed, and the mine’s role is to make this a consistent reality.

All employees and contractors are fully com-mitted to the mine’s zero harm culture and this has reduced the risks on routine work activities.

“When I joined Lanxess , my immediate goal and commitment were to develop a culture of safe performance, where people would go out of their way to identify substandard conditions, acts or obstacles that prevented safe performance and [with] everyone playing their part in correcting these,” Ferreira concludes.