The Contribution of Mopani and Konkola Copper Mines in Enhancing Corporate Social responsibility in Education,Zambia
Date
2016
Authors
Chibuye, Frederick
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
University of Zambia
Abstract
The purpose of this study was to examine and compare the contribution of Mopani and Konkola Copper Mining Companies in enhancing corporate social responsibility in education in Zambia. While the provision of education is the duty of the government, it was of the considered view that the mining companies needed to take part as they were among the beneficiaries of the trained human resource produced by the government from various educational institutions. Hence the study strived to examine the contribution of Mopani and Konkola Copper Mining Companies, towards enhancing education in Zambia as part of their corporate social responsibility.
In getting in-depth understanding of the situation, a descriptive survey study was used as a research design and qualitative approach was used in the study. Hence, in-depth interviews, Focus Group Discussion (FGDs) and semi- structured questionnaires were the research instruments used in primary data collection while secondary data collection involved relevant literature from journal articles, internet, books, and newspapers. The sample size was 96 participants. Simple random sampling procedure was used for a cross section of 90 mine employees (from both companies) while purposive sampling technique was used for 2 Human Resource Managers (HRM), 2 Corporate Affairs Managers (CAMs) and 2 Chief Executive Officers (CEOs). Semi-structured questionnaires were administered to 60 mine employees (30 from each company) and then four Focus Group Discussions (FGDs) on further 30 mine employees fifteen from each mine respectively. The interviews were conducted separately on 2 HRMs, 2 CAMs and 2 CEOs making a total sample of 96 respondents. Maimunah Ismail‟s theory of corporate social responsibility and its role in community development guided this study.
The research findings were that, comparatively, the two mining companies had made some strides in contributing towards enhancing their corporate social responsibility to education. They offered scholarships to school leavers and participated in the administration and running of trades institutions where they equipped their employees with necessary artisan skills. However, they had concentrated more on managing primary and secondary trust schools. These two mining companies differed in the way they offered scholarships to employees and school leavers. MCM admitted about 90% of school leavers into their trade school at the newly established “state of art” trade school in Mufulira. While KCM employees benefited from the company scholarships and sponsored trust school pupils to train abroad particularly in the United Kingdom and South Africa. The mining companies had training policies for example; KCM training policies were more in support of the access to tertiary education by what they had put in place, through their training policies. KCM had good policies on paper while MCM had evidently come out practical in implementing the planned activities, through enhancing their corporate social responsibility in support of education. This research therefore, recommends that the government needs to streamline policy and come up with measures aimed at imploring the mining companies to contribute to the provision of education. Konkola Copper Mine needs to do more to ensure that more school leavers are considered for tertiary education programmes as it builds capacity for the employees with the artisan skills.
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Keywords
Social responsibility of business--Zambia , Mining corporations--Zambia