TORONTO - The world's largest gold producer, Barrick Gold has been named to the NASDAQ Global Sustainability Index of the World's Top 100 Companies. Barrick is the only Canadian mining company to make the semi-annual list.
"We are very pleased to be ranked as a global leader for our sustainability and self-reporting practices by the NASDAQ Global Sustainability Index," said Barrick president and CEO Aaron Regent. "At Barrick, corporate social responsibility is a company-wide priority and we welcome this important recognition, as we continue to strengthen our global performance."
The NASDAQ Global Sustainability Index is made up of companies that have taken a leadership role in disclosing their carbon footprint, energy usage, water consumption, hazardous and non-hazardous waste, employee safety, workforce diversity, management composition and community investing. Companies must also voluntarily disclose their current environmental, social and governance risks and how they could affect performance.
Regent was recently in London, England meeting with leading socially responsible investment organizations. At the meeting, Regent announced that Barrick has joined the Voluntary Principles on Security and Human Rights and two new corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiatives in the area of corporate governance. In 2011, Barrick plans to establish an external CSR Advisory Board and to also appoint an independent director to its.
For the past three years, Barrick has ranked as a world leader in social and environmental responsibility by the Dow Jones Sustainability World Index and has been part of the North America listing since 2007. Barrick was also recently named a climate disclosure leader in an annual global survey by the Carbon Disclosure Project for the company's reporting practices and climate change strategy. Going forward, Barrick will participate in the Water Disclosure Project to promote transparency and understanding of global industrial water use.
In addition, Barrick tied for third out of 100 companies benchmarked in a multi-industry study ranking the water reporting practices of publicly-traded companies and was singled out as having the most comprehensive water accounting of all companies assessed. The study was conducted by Ceres, a Boston-based coalition of investors, with analytical support from Bloomberg and UBS Limited.
For more information about the NASDAQ Sustainability Index and eligibility criteria, visit: http://indexes.NASDAQomx.com.
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