London – 17 February 2023: Women in Mining UK 2022 Summer Internship at Centamin PLC – Phoebe Dawes
Written by: Phoebe Dawes
I was offered an eight-week internship with Centamin PLC, a FTSE 250 gold miner and one of Women in Mining UK’s (WIM UK) Industry Partners, over September and October 2022. I was based at Centamin’s principal asset, the Sukari Gold Mine, located in Egypt’s Nubian Shield. I undertook two projects relating to Supply Chain Due Diligence and Sustainability Performance Monitoring, working with multiple departments at Sukari and under the supervision of the Corporate Head of ESG. I’d like to thank Women in Mining UK and Centamin for providing this opportunity as I gained valuable experience that has solidified my decision to pursue a career in the mining industry.
Upon my arrival in Egypt, I started the internship straight away on site. The site itself is very impressive, about a 35-minute drive from my accommodation in Marsa Alam – and it’s not uncommon to see a herd of camels on your daily commute! When my internship started at Sukari, there were still very few women working on site as the Egyptian law that had previously restricted women from working in certain roles on mine sites had only changed fairly recently. Despite this, it was clear from the start that the site is very welcoming to women and the company is working constantly to improve any challenges arising from the legacy gender imbalance.
My first couple of days were spent completing health and safety inductions and visiting each area of the site to gain an understanding of the process from ore extraction to processing and the management of tailings. I do not have a background in geology or chemistry so the details of how gold is extracted from the ore at Sukari were fascinating and helped me better understand some of the environmental challenges the site faces from a sustainability point of view. I was particularly impressed with the sheer size of all the machinery and the immense planning it takes to ensure each part of the process works smoothly to avoid unnecessary downtime. After this introduction, the incredibly welcoming teams helped me settle into a daily office routine to focus on my projects.
Projects
I was assigned two projects during this internship, one on Supply Chain Due Diligence and the other on Sustainability Performance Monitoring. The Supply Chain Due Diligence project involved identifying high-risk suppliers and streamlining the existing supply chain due diligence process. I had to work closely with the Procurement Team to communicate with suppliers and gather information on their sustainability aspects to ensure we were only working with suppliers that comply with regulatory requirements, abide by the commitments and obligations under Centamin’s policy framework, and ensure that the process could continue independently after my departure.
For the Sustainability Performance Monitoring project, I created a matrix of sustainability indicators that displayed everything that was currently monitored and managed at Sukari regarding the environment, health and safety, workforce wellbeing, and socioeconomic development for the community and Egypt. As part of this project, I was able to visit all the local community initiatives that Centamin supports in Marsa Alam and it was inspiring to see the difference responsible & sustainable mining can have on the local community.
Throughout the internship it was great to speak with the other geology intern about her experience and project findings. We both benefitted from this knowledge exchange to understand more about the different areas of the mine.
Women in Mining
Whilst there is undoubtedly still work to be done to improve the current gender imbalance in the mining industry, the experience I had with Centamin at Sukari was extremely positive. There is a significant effort from management to improve opportunities for women to work at the mine as well as support women already employed.
I am so thankful to have had this this opportunity through Women in Mining UK and I look forward to seeing where my career in the mining industry will take me.