Archive for April, 2009

The posts in this category are thoughts and reflections from a sustainable development course delivered to MBA and other graduate business students at the University of Denver’s Daniels College of Business. I traveled with the group to video the trip (although I’m not at all a videographer, which might explain why nothing to date has become of the footage).

A main story vein is connected to the sustainable development, creative capitalism, and aid-for-Africa discussions occurring in business, social responsibility, TED/Gates Foundation, and other such circles. So-called emerging economies are—thanks to the way the current economic crises has redefined risk—rising to a more prominent place in our investment considerations.

The course’s international travel component is very different from the approach other universities take with international travel courses in two important ways:

1. The travel component is not the focal point of the course: sustainable development in emerging markets is. On-the-ground experiences of the cultural and business landscape are simply a necessity for effective learning outcomes.
2. Unlike most University travel courses (where students do things like visit expats in a boardroom then climb on a tour bus for sightseeing), Daniels’ visits are tied to actual projects the students deliver for the partnering enterprise. Like sustainable development itself, there are multiple value-added outcomes with such an innovative approach.

We were waiting in a Newmont conference room on site at the Ahafo mine. On the agenda: a briefing from Newmont’s General Manager in Ahafo Jay Bastian. He’s going to try and tell us what it’s like to run a place like this. The pressure for profitable production amid the wildly unpredictability that is Africa.

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It’s a strange concept to get your head around. What could a mining company—a gold mining company—possibly teach anyone about sustainability?

If you want some gold today, you don’t settle in a quaint mountain town in the Rockies filled with scrappy boot strappers singing Colorado My Home Sweet Home in hopes of discovering a nice little vein you can claim.

Too many people have done that already.
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If you’re like me, there’s probably nothing you’d like to forget more about the ‘80’s than the music. OK, so I’m often accused of being a music snob. But still. Never Gonna Give You Up. Maneater. We’re Not Gonna Take It.

There was also Live Aid. A purging of self-indulgent guilt from an especially gilded time. We did good, didn’t we? We bought concert tickets around the world. Watched the making of the video. Subscribed to MTV.

Despite the altruism, there are some that would like to forget Live Aid as well. To some, it put irrevocable contexts around African nations that have mitigated their growth and defined narrow (patronizing?) solutions that these countries are struggling to overcome still.
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Riding the bus from the “before” site in Akeym toward the working mine in Ahafo. After meeting, hugging, and looking in the eyes of the people in the surrounding villages, there’s a lot of reflection. There are human beings here. Students are sharing experiences and stories about them.

We have new relationships, and that changes things. Discussions have shifted from theories about relocation operations to relocating people. People we now know.

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We’d just spent a day in the hot and humid forest and small villages in and around Akyem, Ghana. It’s the “before” site: Newmont is going through their stage-gate process of due diligence to determine if its worth opening a mine here.

The task is ungraspable. Items on an endless to-do list: Energy needs. Relocating multiple villages, maybe 10,000 people. Roads and access concerns. NGO buy-in. Still not sure if local Chiefs will give their approval (despite not having de facto governance, politicians and enterprises must have their buy-in). Locations of sustainable farm training facilities. Evaluation of available and competent labor. Evaluation of available and competent ex-pat labor.

Oh — and is there enough gold in the ore samples to be profitable.

What also struck me was the water needs. One Newmont engineer told me he’s struggling with a solution to re-routing rivers and streams for the water supply. You need a lot of water to mine gold. A fresh and plentiful water supply for two lakes: a clean one for the water needs of the processing operations, and another to mix with the used cyanide and sulfur dioxide in the destruction process.

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It’s like a unknown, unmapped compound straight out the X Files. Newmont has built a community in the middle of Ghanaian nowhere for its western expat employees at Ahafo. A pristine suburbia with driveways, lawns, playgrounds, sidewalks, concrete curbs. Flower pots on porches.

And a community center in the middle of it. The gathering place for middle management to vent frustrations of Denver senior leadership, share stories of near mishaps, talk about home.

It was here, drinking beer and eating bar-b-queue, when a concept that’s been bouncing around in my head finally settled.

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He’s a big guy. Smart. Ghanaian friendliness exemplified. A presence barefaced in its proclamation: “Challenge me? Sure. But you better bring it.” Kwasi Boateng, Social Investment Manager at the project in Akyem.

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