Background

Following the release of a 1st Draft of the IRMA Mining Standard V2.0 in October 2023 for a 90-day public consultation, the IRMA Secretariat received more than 2,500 points of comments from 82 organizations, organized additional engagement with stakeholders and Indigenous rights-holders, and solicited complementary guidance from multiple topic-specific Expert Working Groups.

We first anticipated the release of a 2nd Draft – for a second round of public consultation – as early as Q3 2024, then subsequently announced that this would likely not be approved by the IRMA multi-stakeholder equally-governed Board of Directors before March 2025. We provided a detailed explanation for why the process was taking longer than planned.

Where are we now?

We are now in June and a sub-group of the IRMA Board of Directors is still actively working to resolve the final points of disagreements. This discussion is entirely focused on the draft revised Chapter dedicated to the management of Mine Waste Facilities, including tailings storage/management facilities (TSF or TMF), especially with regard to the GISTM standard and the recent announcement of a Global Tailings Management Institute being established to oversee it.

Once all issues are resolved and approved by the IRMA Board, the Secretariat will be able to release the 2nd Draft IRMA Mining Standard V2.0 for a 60-day consultation period.

(NOTE: the Board agreeing to release a Draft Standard for consultation does not constitute endorsement of everything in the Standard; it will be an invitation to the world to help further improve and refine the revision of the IRMA Mining Standard for the Responsible Exploration, Extraction, and Processing of Minerals.)

Expert Working Groups: 2025 and beyond

At the time of the release of the 2nd Draft IRMA Mining Standard V2.0 for public consultation, the IRMA Secretariat plans to circulate a call for interest to refresh and restart the topic-specific IRMA Expert Working Groups (EWG). The final list of topics to be covered is being finalized, and Terms of Reference are being updated.

We express our gratitude to you all again for your patience and understanding, as IRMA remains committed to working transparently on the revision of the world’s most comprehensive and rigorous standard available for the minerals sector.

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