Materiality
Since we released our Sustainability Reports in September 2008 (summary version and full version) we have revised and formalised our process for the selection of the material issues for inclusion in our sustainability reporting for FY2009. Our revised process assists us to identify and assess issues that have significance to our stakeholders and are potentially material to BHP Billiton. The process is based on three steps:
Step 1 Identify issues
A review process has been undertaken based on AccountAbility's five-part materiality test, which includes areas such as policy, peer based norms, stakeholder concerns, societal norms and direct short-term financial impacts. (AccountAbility are a not-for-profit partnership that promotes accountability innovation.) In this reporting year, we have also tested the process with members of our Forum on Corporate Responsibility.
The process involves consideration of issues arising from our:
- Corporate policies review
- Peer report review
- NGO campaigns review
- Media review
- Regulatory review
- Risk register review
Step 2 Prioritise issues
To identify both a core set of long-term global sustainability issues, as well as important one-off local issues for reporting, we rate the significance of the issue to our stakeholders and the potential impact on our business. Each issue is rated and prioritised as low, medium or high.
Step 3 Review issues
The third step is a common sense check of the process outcomes. It is our aim to limit the size of the report as far as possible without impacting on the provision of disclosures around our material issues. We have also tested the initial outcomes with members of our Forum on Corporate Responsibility.
As per previous years our material issues include topics around governance, our employees, safety and health, environment and social responsibility.
In compiling our report we have also used the International Council on Mining and Metals (ICMM) Sustainable Development Framework and have taken guidance from the GRI Guidelines (G3). Material 'core' and 'sector supplement' indicators have been addressed and 'additional' indicators have been prioritised where we consider they are material to our business or of particular interest to our stakeholders.
We have endeavoured to ensure that our report coverage is sufficient so that stakeholders can confidently assess our sustainability performance during the reporting period. We have included both positive and negative aspects of our performance to enable a balanced assessment of overall performance. To highlight trends and enable comparability we strive to report on core elements of our approach and performance in a way that is comparable year-on-year.
We aim to report accurately on our performance and each year we seek third party assurance so that stakeholders can access an independent view of our reporting and we can obtain feedback to assist us with continual improvement. (See the limited assurance statements from Ernst & Young (PDF, 2.3MB) and KPMG (PDF, 2.3MB) in the Supplementary Information (PDF, 2.3MB) document.) As part of the BHP Billiton Annual Reporting suite our report is produced on an annual, financial year basis.
Given the size and nature of our organisation, we recognise that it is not possible for the Group's sustainability reporting to comprehensively meet the information needs of all our stakeholders, particularly at the local and regional level. Our operations separately produce their own reports to provide a review of health, safety, environment and community issues and performance specific to their site and stakeholder circumstances.
