World Day for Safety and Health at Work

Equinox Gold is committed to identifying and mitigating health and safety risks and hazards before accidents occur so that every member of our workforce goes home safe and sound at the end of each shift.

At Equinox Gold, we believe that health and safety is everyone’s responsibility. Our top priority is to achieve a culture of zero harm. To encourage innovation and leadership, we have established three awards to recognize safety excellence within our company.

Our primary award is the Chairman’s Safety Award, which recognizes the mine site team that demonstrates the best relative safety performance for a given year.

In 2021 we initiated two additional awards. The COO Most Improved Safety Award is presented to the site that shows the best overall improvement in safety performance compared with the previous year. To recognize individuals who have displayed exemplary safety leadership, we have the CEO Safety Leader Award.

In recognition of World Day for Safety and Health at Work, we are pleased to announce the following winners of Equinox Gold’s 2021 safety awards.

The winner of the Chairman’s Safety Award is Mesquite Mine for achieving the lowest Total Recordable Injury Frequency Rate (TRIFR) of 2.41. During 2021 Mesquite also celebrated the milestone of working five full years with no lost-time incidents.

The winner of the COO Most Improved Safety Award is Aurizona Mine for achieving a 28% reduction in its TRIFR compared to its 2020 performance.

The winner of the CEO Safety Leadership Award is Elinio dos Santos Gomes of Aurizona Mine for his innovation in developing and implementing a device that allows the team to safely carry and dispense barbed wire for fencing. Second place was awarded to Cesar Muñoz García from Los Filos Mine for his passion and commitment to safety. Cesar has been with Los Filos for over 16 years and is a member of the Emergency Response Team and an active member of the Safety and Hygiene Committee. Third place was awarded to Djailson Lima de Oliviera from the Santa Luz Mine, who leads the team that designs and installs machine guards to ensure they comply with legislation, with a focus on minimizing risks around rotating equipment parts.

While there can only be one winner of the Chairman’s Safety Award, the company as a whole performed very well in 2021. Equinox Gold set the ambitious 2021 target of improving its Total Recordable Injury Frequency Rate (TRIFR) by 27% compared to the 2020 target. We surpassed that new target, achieving a TRIFR reduction to 3.05 per million hours worked, 13% better than our 2021 target of 3.51 and 19% better than our 2020 performance of 3.76.

Equinox Gold is a member of the Mine Safety Round Table and follows industry best practices including the Towards Sustainable Mining Safety and Health Protocol, the Responsible Gold Mining Principles and ISO 45001.