Sarah de Blois of Sudbury is advocating for more women in mining and more of them in leadership roles
A Sudbury woman, working on her PhD thesis, believes a lot more needs to be done for the acceptance of women working in all levels of the mining industry.
Sarah de Blois was competing this past week in the provincial finals of the 3MT competition (Three Minute Thesis) to outline her dissertation “Women, Mining & Gender: Experiences from Sudbury, Ontario.”
In her 16-year career in the mining industry, Renee Grogan has battled hostile environments, arduous work conditions, and the perception that women don’t belong at a mine site—let alone in a mining-company boardroom. But her biggest battle has only just begun: getting climate-conscious car buyers to care as much about how the metals going into their new electric-vehicle (EV) batteries are mined as they do about their carbon emissions.
“Consumers don’t generally know what their metal footprint looks like,” says Grogan, the co-founder and chief sustainability officer of California-based Impossible Mining, a battery-metal mining startup.
https://www.northernontariobusiness.com/
Sudbury’s Collège Boréal will offer Mining Potential program starting Feb. 16
Collège Boréal is offering a new training program designed to draw more youth, women, and newcomers to the mining industry. The Mining Potential program, created and delivered in partnership with the Mining Industry Human Resources Council (MiHR), is a 14-week work readiness skilled training program being delivered at the college’s Sudbury and Timmins campuses.
Following a hybrid online and in-class format, the course is designed to give participants a solid foot in the door to eventually find work in the sector. The first cohort is expected to get underway on Feb. 16.
(Bloomberg) — Noxolo Bobotyane, a veteran of more than a decade in South Africa’s gold fields, has seen first hand how women are sexually harassed as they start their shifts each day. Jammed into a metal cage with other mineworkers as they descend deep below the earth’s surface, there is literally no way out.
“The distance we are standing when we are inside the cage, we are so close to each other,” said Bobotyane, who is a union steward. “A man will touch you, when you are just standing in front of him and there is no way you can go anywhere, you are just standing in front of him. So you just wait for the cage to go down.”
https://www.bloombergquint.com/
(Bloomberg Opinion) — Life in a mining camp in 2022 can often seem little different to conditions that prevailed a century ago. “[I have a] fear of violence. [There are] catcalls, advances made in camp when you are alone,” one Rio Tinto Group employee at a remote mine site told an internal commission into workplace culture which reported on Feb. 1.
“The men would sit on the stools and watch every single female that walked past. Some made comments. Some just stared … I ended up feeling so uncomfortable that I started making sure I had a buddy to walk to dinner and back with every single night — even when it wasn’t dark.”
YELLOWKNIFE, Canada – Rio Tinto has appointed Angela Bigg president and chief operating officer of the Diavik Diamond Mine. Angela, previously general manager, Operations at Diavik, will be the first female to lead the mine and its 1,100 employees.
Angela joined the Diavik team in November of 2017 as vice president, Finance. She began her career with Rio Tinto in 2005 and has worked in Mozambique, South Africa and Australia, where she is from. She succeeds Richard Storrie, who has decided to leave the company to pursue other opportunities.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/sudbury/
A new group in Sudbury, Ont., wants to help more women get jobs in the mining industry. Women represent around one in 10 workers in Canada’s mining industry, and number that hasn’t changed much in the last 10 years, according to Jennifer Dallaire, treasurer of the Sudbury chapter of Women in Mining.
The chapter launched in early 2020, but due to the COVID-19 pandemic, it just recently held its first networking event. About 50 people participated in the event. They ranged from women already working in the industry, to students and business owners.
https://www.northernontariobusiness.com/
Sudbury mining engineer Theresa Nyabeze has been recognized as one of 100 Accomplished Black Canadian (ABC) Women in 2020.
Now in its third edition, the 100 ABC Women initiative aims to celebrate and archive the professional accomplishments of trailblazing Black women from across Canada. The non-profit organization behind the program said its goal is to create a database for current and future generations.
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/
Marie Inkster, Lundin Mining Corp’s chief executive officer for just three years, says she is stepping down for “personal reasons,” adding that speculation about board dissatisfaction with her performance is incorrect.
Toronto-based Lundin, one of Canada’s biggest base metals companies, said in a news release Ms. Inkster will give up the CEO position at the end of the year. She will be succeeded by Peter Rockandel, a former long-time banker with GMP Capital Inc. who is currently senior vice-president, corporate development and investor relations, of Lundin.
She had a ritual that involved loading and reloading a shotgun in front of a group of men. The message seemed clear enough: Stay away.
“I would sleep with it right next to my bed, sometimes right in the bed next to me, and I’d have my bear spray right there, too,” said the unidentified woman who is quoted in a new report documenting the experiences of Indigenous women and women of colour at mining camps in Yukon and Northern B.C.
The report, titled “Never Until Now,” was commissioned by the non-profit Liard Aboriginal Women’s Society. It suggests that women are often assigned low-paying, menial jobs at mines because of their gender — and it’s those very roles that often compromise their personal safety.
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/
More than half of Inuit women surveyed by Pauktuutit Inuit Women of Canada in a report funded by the federal government said they have been sexually harassed at mining sites in Canada’s Far North.
According to the report released on Wednesday by Pauktuutit, a national non-profit Inuit women’s advocacy organization, the most frequent harassment incidents directed at Inuit women were “sexual comments, jokes, unwanted touching and emotional abuse.”
Some of the Inuit reported being the subject of sexual violence as frequently as every shift. Some reported feeling particularly vulnerable because they worked in housekeeping and janitorial positions that often placed them in private areas such as bedrooms and bathrooms.
At a recent Association for Mineral Exploration panel on diversity and inclusion, the guests shared some horror stories—and agreed that things are changing for the better
Moderator Kendra Johnston didn’t mince words when she kicked off a recent panel discussion.
Johnston, president and CEO of the Association for Mineral Exploration, explained that she looked for midcareer geologists and mining engineers from a variety of ethnic backgrounds to join A Conversation on Diversity and Inclusion in Mineral Exploration, part of last week’s AME Remote Roundup conference.
“It felt a little bit odd to be out there searching for a Black geologist,” she admitted to panellist John Antwi, who is from Ghana. Finding one in North America was no easy task, Johnston added, noting that Antwi is actually a mining engineer.
“What are your comments on that, knowing that you are here because you have a really important value-add to the conversation, but you’re also here because you’re Black?”
Adventure takes on many forms. It could be jungle escapes, ziplining or maybe sailing ocean waves. Ellen (Nellie) Cashman’s life was an adventure into gold rushes, establishing businesses, and grubstaking prospectors.
Her work included philanthropy, especially where miners were concerned. A single woman, she earned the respect of stampeders and adoration from the causes she supported.
Cashman took a circuitous route to Canada. When a teenager, Cashman (born circa 1845) immigrated to Boston in about 1860 with her sister and widowed mother. The women were part of a Catholic Irish migration wave searching for a better life.
https://www.northernontariobusiness.com/
A pair of mining executives from Sudbury has been included in the 2020 edition of the book 100 Global Inspirational Women in Mining.
Alicia Woods, founder and president of Covergalls, and Jody Kuzenko, president and CEO of Torex Gold Resources, have been recognized among 100 women from around the globe whose contributions are working toward a “stronger, safer and more sustainable mining industry.”
“Having visible role models is critical if we are going to attract and retain more women to help solve the challenges of global development and the responsible supply of resources for future generations,” said Carole Cable, chair of Women in Mining UK, in a Nov. 19 news release.
https://argogold.ca/
Judy Baker is President and CEO of Argo Gold and Delio Tortosa is a geological consultant.
After a 25-year lag in gold exploration in the Uchi Gold Camp, Argo Gold Inc. has been reviving exploration discovery interest in the ‘shadow of the headframe’ south of the historical Uchi Gold Mine with its high-grade Uchi Gold Project in Northwestern Ontario.
During the mid-1930s to the early 1940s, four gold mines were developed by Uchi Mines Ltd. under the direction of Jack Hammel, a well known mine developer in the Red Lake area. The gold mines are in the southeast end of the Birch-Uchi Greenstone Belt, about 100 km east of the prolific Red Lake Greenstone Belt.
Argo Gold’s Uchi Gold Project of 22 square kilometers of 100% owned claims is the highly prospective, yet relatively unexplored ground immediately south and on trend with the historical mines.
