JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – Mining company Exxaro and trade union Solidarity have signed a three-year collective agreement on wages and other conditions of service, Mining Weekly Online can report. 

The union said on Thursday that the first year’s pay increases of 7.5% to 10% would be back dated to July 1.

In the second and third years of the agreement, the wage component would increase by 7.50% across the board.

The Johannesburg Stock Exchange-listed Exxaro and Solidarity also agreed to a contribution of 60% by the employer to the medical aid benefit of the main member, and to a contribution of 50% in the case of dependants.

Included in the agreement is what Solidarity described as a “favourable adjustment” to family leave and to the subsistence allowance.

“We’re delighted with the agreement as it provides for stability in the job environment and it offers job security to our members,” said Solidarity deputy general secretary for mining Connie Prinsloo in a release to Creamer Media’s Mining Weekly Online. 

Black-led Exxaro has also signed a three-year wage agreement with the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM), which brought an end to NUM’s wage strike at Exxaro’s Grootegeluk mine, located in the Waterberg coalfield of the Limpopo province, and Leeuwpan Colliery, located in the Delmas area of the Mpumalanga province. 

Exxaro is headed by CEO Mxolisi Mgojo, who is the current president of the Chamber of Mines of South Africa.