Building Opportunities

For us, responsible mining is about more than mitigating risk and limiting impacts. It’s also about building opportunities – opportunities for our people, for local communities and for host governments.

Everywhere we operate we aim to enrich lives by developing lasting opportunities for our stakeholders. Our operations bring tangible benefits to our employees, local communities and national economies.

As employers, we add value to communities by providing local workers with well-paying jobs to support their families and build prosperous local economies. Our emphasis on ongoing training provides our employees with opportunities to develop their skills while they work with us and enables them to pursue new opportunities after the life of the mine.

As neighbours, we invest in health, infrastructure and education initiatives in the towns and villages near our operations. These initiatives generate many benefits, from improving educational outcomes for children to building economic capacity and contributing to a growing tax base for regions. At all of our operations, we work closely with our local partners to build strong, vibrant communities – communities that will continue to thrive well beyond the life of our mines. We encourage local stakeholders to contribute to, and benefit from, our projects.

As corporate citizens, we contribute to the economic prosperity of host nations. Our projects are sources of foreign direct investment for countries and generate direct taxes and royalties for governments. Once in production, our assets provide valuable export revenues and can contribute significantly to a country’s trade balance. Host nations must share in the success of their natural resource development.

“Our 20-year history of successfully operating in Brazil and Turkey is testament to how we continue to manage our key relationships in those countries. This is an ongoing process: it takes as much effort to maintain those relationships and credibility as it does to establish them in the first place.”

Paul Wright, CEO

Local business creation at Efemçukuru

In 2010, 25 local people started a small firm that offered truck services to the Efemçukuru mine. Initially, the business operated a single water truck that was contracted to water the mine access road and minimize dust. Today, the firm has just under 50 employees and a fleet of 20 vehicles, providing transportation for Efemçukuru employees and visitors to and from the site, as well as transfers for local high school and junior high school students.

Sustainable Economic Development in China

Jinfeng has consistently worked with local communities to increase crops for consumption and revenue, and to support economic development that will last beyond the mine. One of these crop programs is sugarcane farming, with Jinfeng subsidizing the cost of creating arable land and helping with field access road construction and maintenance. In 2014, 49 households from three nearby villages planted sugarcane, bringing the total revenue from crops since the program began in 2011 to about $1 million.

“Every day we work hard to maximize our social and economic impacts and minimize our environmental impacts. We aim to partner with communities and governments to develop sustainable opportunities.”

Norm Pitcher, President

Case Study: Building on trust in Turkey

Historically, Kişladağ was not a mining region. The local community was unfamiliar with mining and the industry was viewed with skepticism. We recognized this as an opportunity to educate people about how mining has evolved in general and about Eldorado’s track record and approach in particular.

In keeping with Turkish culture, we met with community members in local tea houses, answering their questions about the project and learning about the area and its needs so we could identify initiatives where Eldorado could make a positive contribution to the community. We heard that the surrounding villages lacked clean water and adequate sewage systems, so we took action to address these needs during the exploration phase. Over time, through open dialogue and by keeping our commitments, Eldorado established a reputation for honesty and credibility that has made us a welcome neighbour and valued partner in the region.

In 2014, we demonstrated our continued support for the Kişladağ community when we completed two major projects. The first was the completion in September 2014 of a new building for Uşak University, near Kişladağ. The 8,000 m2 building includes 42 classrooms and can accommodate 4,000 students, enabling the university to create a new department and increase enrolment. The second was the completion in August 2014 of a primary school in Uşak province that has 16 classrooms and can accommodate 480 students (pictured above).

These two projects – among others – show how our financial donations are significantly increasing the opportunities for students in the surrounding area to pursue their education.

Promoting health in China

Medical care has been a key concern of the people living in the local communities near White Mountain. In 2014, White Mountain, working with the government, academics and communities, brought together a few organizations to build a local clinic near the mine in Diaoshuihu Village. White Mountain then led construction of the clinic, which was completed in November 2014. The clinic will serve approximately 1,500 people from 450 households.

Open doors in Greece

We believe that an important characteristic of being a good neighbour in the communities where we operate is welcoming visitors to our sites. In 2014, we started a series of tours of our Greek operations. This began as an initiative to familiarize local residents with our premises and our environmental commitment. Initially, most of the visitors were retired miners, who wanted to see how the mining industry has advanced, and local women, as the local mining workforce was traditionally male-dominated and the majority of women had never been to the mines. As word spread, the program grew, and by the end of 2014 around 4,000 people from all over Greece had toured our site. These visitors get to directly observe our mining operations and talk with Company managers about environmental and social issues.

Direct Economic Impact of our Operations (‘000s $)

TOTAL AMOUNT SPENT ON EMPLOYEE WAGES AND BENEFITS TOTAL AMOUNT PAID TO GOVERNMENT, INCLUDING TAXES AND ROYALTIES TOTAL AMOUNT SPENT ON COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT PROJECTS AND DONATIONS
Kişladağ 28,000 11,500 5,169
Efemçukuru 16,511 10,447 461
Jinfeng 16,944 19,339 182
Tanjianshan 12,164 27,679 121
White Mountain 14,474 13,438 246
Greek Group* 45,713 48,831 4,679
Vila Nova 7,825 464 214
TOTAL 141,631 131,698 11,072

* Includes Stratoni, Olympias, Skouries, Perama Hill and Sapes