The South African Guideline for the Reporting of Environmental, Social and Governance Parameters within the Mining and Oil and Gas Industries (SAMESG) was the recipient of this year’s United Nations Intergovernmental Working Group of Experts on International Standards of Accounting and Reporting (ISAR) Honours Award.

Now in its second year, the ISAR Honours 2019 attracted 33 global entrants.

The ISAR Honours initiative recognises the policy, institutional and capacity-building efforts of different stakeholders that encourage and assist enterprises to publish data on their contribution to the implementation of 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, and facilitate dissemination of good practices in this area, the SAMESG Committee explained in a statement on Friday.

SAMESG also received the award for an Outstanding National Initiative to Advance the Sustainable Development Goals.

In a ceremony held in the Palais des Nations, in Geneva, Switzerland, on October 30, SAMESG Committee vice-chairperson Anneli Botha received the award on behalf of the committee.

She commented that “the development of the SAMESG guideline was seen as an imperative considering that resources companies listed on the JSE, at that time, were not subjected to a formalised standard for reporting on environmental, social and governance (ESG) matters and determining their impact on mineral project reserves, resources and valuations”.

Chairperson Teresa Steele-Schober noted that “the SAMESG guideline was developed collaboratively under the mandate of the Samcodes Standards Committee (SSC) on initiation by Professor Frederick Cawood, the then-chairperson of the SSC, and delivered collaboratively under the leadership of former chairperson Sarah Magnus and Botha”.

The SAMESG Committee believes the guideline, when applied diligently, has the potential to significantly improve the quality of information made available to investors in and shareholders of mineral resources companies in respect of  ESG considerations.