The Consolidated Mining Standards Initiative (CMSI) responds to society’s growing demand for responsible mining practices. We aim to bring together the best aspects of four well-established standards – The Copper Mark, Mining Association of Canada’s Towards Sustainable Mining (TSM), World Gold Council’s Responsible Gold Mining Principles and ICMM’s Mining Principles – into one, global standard that reduces complexity and clarifies responsible practices for mining companies of all sizes, across all locations and commodities.
Once finalised, the Standard is expected to be used by existing members of ICMM, World Gold Council and Mining Association of Canada, and participants of The Copper Mark. This broad adoption would give the Standard the widest coverage of any voluntary mining standard to date, with implementation anticipated to include almost 100 mining companies across approximately 600 facilities in around 60 countries.
The Urgency for Consolidation
While a tonne of metal from different sources is indistinguishable to the eye, whether it has been produced, processed and recycled responsibly carries immense implications for society and our planet. Since we can’t distinguish between responsibly and irresponsibly produced metals simply by looking at or using everyday products, we have relied on governments to regulate minimal production, processing and recycling. However, governments alone can’t address the full scope of the challenge. Increasingly, society expects those mining, recycling or converting metals into products to follow responsible standards backed by independent assurance and transparent disclosure.
In the last two decades, many such standards have emerged. Encouragingly, hundreds of producers and users of metals have embraced these standards, meaning that many of the essential materials circulating in our economy today are increasingly being produced responsibly.
However, with an estimated 25,000 mining companies globally and thousands more in mineral and metals value chains, the number of producers following no standards far outweighs those that do. The complexity of multiple overlapping standards has become a barrier, especially for smaller producers who might be concerned about which standard to follow, about implementation and whether the standard they use will be recognised and respected by stakeholders or customers down the value chain. Reducing complexity, both in the number of Standards and in their content and assurance – while raising the bar – is vital.
Driving Industry-Wide Adoption
This is the Consolidated Mining Standard Initiative’s ambition. By bringing together the best of four of the most widely used standards, the CMSI reduces complexity in the standards landscape and sets clear, high-bar expectations of responsible practices for all producers, irrespective of size, commodity or geography. At the same time, CMSI focuses on making the Standard and assurance process as effective and practical as possible, reducing barriers to implementation and increasing the number of companies that follow a credible standard.
An Inclusive, Independent Oversight System
CMSI’s proposed governance model will feature an independent Board, equally balancing commercial and non-commercial interests from both mining (upstream) and value chain (downstream) participants, with no single group having undue influence over the others. This structure supports shared decision-making power through consensus, fostering widespread confidence and buy-in from diverse stakeholders.
A Multi-stakeholder Process
CMSI demonstrates a new kind of industry leadership—one that shares power, fosters unity, and builds consensus. We have worked with two groups to develop an initiative that reflects both industry realities and stakeholder expectations: a Stakeholder Advisory Group (SAG) and an Industry Advisory Group (IAG). While these two groups are structurally separate, functionally they are integrated and have been meeting and working together throughout the process.
How to Get Involved
The first public consultation is now closed, and feedback will be summarised and published in a consultation report in due course. For full transparency, the individual consultation responses will also be publicly available with the permission of those consulted.
The feedback will guide updates to the Standard and oversight system that will be shared for a second round of public consultation in 2025.
