WELCOME TO RUFFER

All-weather investing

Seeking consistent positive returns.

Come rain or shine.

Ruffer provides investment management services for institutions, pension funds, charities, financial planners and individual investors.
Location
Select your Location
UK
Europe
Australia
US
Asia
Middle East
Channel Islands
Rest of world
Visitor Type
Select investor type
Select investor type
Individual investors
I invest on my own behalf, am a job seeker or want to learn more about Ruffer
Intermediary
I am a financial advisor or wealth manager
Institutional
I am a professional client or eligible counterparty
Charity
I am a charity trustee, or a consultant who advises charities
Individual investors
I invest on my own behalf, am a job seeker or want to learn more about Ruffer
Institutional
I am a professional client or eligible counterparty
Charity
I am a charity trustee, or a consultant who advises charities
Wholesale
I am a financial advisor, wealth manager or institutional investor
Retail
I invest on my own behalf, am a job seeker, a journalist or want to learn more about Ruffer
Institutional
I am a professional client or eligible counterparty
Institutional
I am a professional client or eligible counterparty
Institutional
I am a professional client or eligible counterparty
All investors
I invest on my own behalf, am a job seeker or want to learn more about Ruffer
All investors
I invest on my own behalf, am a job seeker or want to learn more about Ruffer
Remember my choice
London
Ruffer LLP
80 Victoria Street
London SW1E 5JL
Directions | Map +44 (0)20 7963 8100
Paris
Ruffer S.A.
103 boulevard Haussmann
75008 Paris, France
Directions | Map +33 (0)1 88 45 02 54
New York
Ruffer LLC
300 Park Avenue
New York NY 10022
Directions | Map +1 917 947 3003
Edinburgh
Ruffer LLP
31 Charlotte Square
Edinburgh EH2 4ET
Directions | Map +44 (0)131 202 1602

Tailings dams

8 mins | Responsible investment
Responsible Investment
Charalee Hoelzl
Investment Manager*
5 October 2020

We have been mining the world’s natural resources for thousands of years. Yet the global demand for these is only likely to increase in the future, given their role in supporting economic and social progress and enabling innovations and technologies that are needed to address climate change.

As a by-product of the mining process, the global mining industry produces billions of tonnes of mine tailings each year. This waste material is stored in tailings dams,‡ which are among some of the world’s largest engineered structures. It has been estimated that there are approximately 18,000 mine tailings storage facilities globally, of which 3,500 are currently active.1

Necessary hazards?

Several recent and catastrophic tailings dam collapses have brought into focus the complex interaction between a mine site and the local community and environment in which it operates. The failure of the tailings dam at the Córrego do Feijão iron ore mine in Brumadinho, Brazil, in January 2019 is one of the most devastating. When the dam collapsed, 12 million m3 of toxic mining waste surged through the mine site towards the town below, killing 270 people and causing widespread environmental and socio-economic damage.2 It followed another failure of the Fundão tailings dam in Mariana only four years earlier, in the same state in Brazil and by the same mine owners; at least 19 people were killed when the dam breached and abruptly discharged over 43 million m3 of tailings, polluting the region’s most important river, the Rio Doce, and causing what has been termed the biggest environmental disaster in the global mining industry.3

The subsequent rise in scrutiny and renewed sense of urgency to understand the risks posed by tailings facilities and their potential for failure has been preceded by decades of stakeholder campaigns along with calls for greater public disclosure and corporate accountability.4 Yet the failures at Mariana, and then Brumadinho, were evidence that change was not happening from within the industry.

In April 2019, efforts gained momentum when a group of institutional investors (now representing more than $13 trillion assets under management)5 governed through a steering committee chaired by the Church of England Pensions Board and the Council on Ethics of the Swedish AP Funds established an investor-led engagement initiative, known as the Investor Mining and Tailings Safety Initiative (the ‘Initiative’); Ruffer began supporting the Initiative in April 2019.

This has led to several key interventions.

An international safety standard

First, the Initiative called for a new, independent international standard for tailings dams.

In response, and in collaboration with the Principles for Responsible Investment (PRI), the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) and the International Council on Mining and Metals (ICMM) a Global Tailings Review was commissioned. On 5 August 2020, the Global Industry Standard on Tailings Management† (the ‘Standard’) was launched. The Standard establishes a first-of-its kind international benchmark and sets a new normative aspiration for the management of tailings facilities by declaring an ‘ultimate goal of zero harm to people and the environment, with zero tolerance for human fatality.’6 By establishing clear expectations around transparency, accountability and safeguarding the rights of affected people, it is hoped the Standard will mark a step-change in the industry.

Responsible Investment
Open letter requesting greater disclosure and a global tailings database

Secondly, the Initiative issued an open letter to 726 companies requesting public disclosure on specific questions about their tailings facilities. With this information, the world’s first global database of mine tailings facilities was launched in January this year, allowing public access to detailed information on more than 1,800 tailings dams around the world, categorised by location, company, dam type, height, volume and risk, among other factors.7

The first round of disclosures has captured many of the world’s largest tailings dams operated by publicly listed companies, but the project intends to increase the number of dams described and be ‘a global hub, providing up to date and reliable information on tailings storage facilities, in the public interest.’8

Next steps for Ruffer

As a supporter of the Investor Mining and Tailings Safety Initiative, we have been engaging with companies over the last 18 months on their disclosures and encouraging companies that have so far not yet responded, to do so. For some time, Ruffer has held a material weighting in gold mining companies. This issue of tailings management is therefore relevant to a number of the companies in which we are invested and we joined the Initiative as we agree with its aims and what it is trying to achieve.

Looking forward, it is hoped that the tailings database and the public disclosure provisions in the Standard will drive a new level of transparency in the mining sector and encourage companies, regardless of their size, to view tailings management as an industry problem that requires a collective industry solution. At the same time, it is expected that these disclosures will enable investors to develop an assessment framework to analyse companies’ tailings management and hold their management to account if necessary. At Ruffer, we will continue to include these factors in our engagements on environmental, social and governance considerations with mining companies in our portfolios.

#climate change, #governance, #responsible investment
The geopolitical implications of a changing climate
Since the late eighteenth century, societies have experienced an unprecedented increase in material wealth. This has lifted billions out of poverty and those born today have, on average, a better quality of life and broader opportunities. Yet industrialisation... has had a devastating effect on the world’s natural capital.
Read
Why diversity matters in investment
Robust diversity policies encourage the balanced representation of a variety of individuals who bring experience from contrasting backgrounds.
Read
Responsible Investment Report 2019
We believe that investing responsibly will lead to better long-term performance for our clients. As an investment manager with a relatively concentrated portfolio of equity holdings, we believe ESG considerations represent both sources of value and also investment risks.
Read
  1. Church of England
  2. vale.com 259 people have been officially confirmed dead and 11 people reported as missing
  3. The Córrego do Feijão mine was owned by Vale, the Samarco iron ore mine was operated by Samarco Mineração, a mining company jointly owned by Vale and BHP; Flávio Fonsecado Carmo et al (2017) ‘Fundão tailings dam failures: the environment tragedy of the largest technological disaster of Brazilian mining in global context’, Perspectives in Ecology and Conservation 15, 145–151
  4. Owen J.R., Kemp, D., Lebre, E., Svobodova K. and Perez Murillo, G. (2020) ‘Catastrophic tailings dam failures and disaster risk disclosure’, International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction
  5. Church of England, 22 September 2020
  6. Global Tailings Review
  7. Global Tailings Portal, 22 September 2020
  8. Global Tailings Portal

* Charalee worked at Ruffer until January 2022

‡ Physical structures used to store by-products from mining activities. Mined rock is ground and mixed with chemicals and water to extract the minerals and metals. Tailings are what are left once the minerals and metals have been extracted and usually take the form of a slurry of fine particles, but can be solid or liquid.

† Global Industry Standard on Tailings Management: I Affected Communities | II Integrated Knowledge base | III Design, Construction, Operation and Monitoring of the Tailings Facility | IV Management and Governance | V Emergency Response and Long-term recovery | VI Public Disclosure and Access to Information

The views expressed in this article are not intended as an offer or solicitation for the purchase or sale of any investment or financial instrument, including interests in any of Ruffer’s funds. The information contained in the article is fact based and does not constitute investment research, investment advice or a personal recommendation, and should not be used as the basis for any investment decision. This document does not take account of any potential investor’s investment objectives, particular needs or financial situation. This document reflects Ruffer’s opinions at the date of publication only, the opinions are subject to change without notice and Ruffer shall bear no responsibility for the opinions offered. Read the full disclaimer.
Ruffer Review
Minds over matter
Whilst technology has transformed stock markets over the centuries, they are underpinned by human traits like fear and greed, which remain unaltered. But one key recent change has been to markets’ purpose, and this risks severe instability.
27 mins | Alexander Chartres
Read
Investment review
Investment Review
April 2024: Jonathan Ruffer discusses the stock market’s seemingly invincible summer. This has created distortions in both debt and equity markets, and with them, opportunities to benefit from a change in the season.
Audio icon
15 mins | Jonathan Ruffer
Read
Green Line
Out of sight, out of mind
April 2024: Markets today are very different to the pre-2008 era. But has systemic risk been removed or relocated?
5 mins | Jamie Dannhauser
Read
London
Ruffer LLP
80 Victoria Street
London SW1E 5JL
Directions | Map +44 (0)20 7963 8100
Paris
Ruffer S.A.
103 boulevard Haussmann
75008 Paris, France
Directions | Map +33 (0)1 88 45 02 54
New York
Ruffer LLC
300 Park Avenue
New York NY 10022
Directions | Map +1 917 947 3003
Edinburgh
Ruffer LLP
31 Charlotte Square
Edinburgh EH2 4ET
Directions | Map +44 (0)131 202 1602