Canadian Mining Hall of Fame looks to the future with newest inductees

The Canadian Mining Hall of Fame (CMHF) held its 35th annual induction ceremony on May 24 at the Carlu in Toronto, welcoming three new honourees, and bringing total membership up to 203.

The celebration, attended by around 530 people, was hosted by The Northern Miner Group’s president, Anthony Vaccaro, and president and CEO of the Mining Association of Canada, Pierre Gratton. Full bios of all the inductees are available here.

Jim Cooney: A non-miner no longer

The first inductee of the night was Jim Cooney, who promoted the concept of sustainable development and encouraged the adoption of policies to improve mining’s environmental and social impacts.

In 1976, he was hired “as an outsider” by Cominco (now Teck Resources) as a researcher with the company’s strategic planning group. He would eventually become a leading advocate for sustainable development in mining, particularly at Placer Dome which became the first mining company to adopt a corporate sustainable development policy in 1997.

In a video interview, Cooney said his first assignment was to go to Tanzania to prepare a country risk assessment, a task he was given for his unique perspectives based on his study of political science at Georgetown University and Asian languages and philosophy at the University of Toronto. Those perspectives set him apart from most people in the business.