Family happiness underpins success of mining
Published on 08 November, 2012
For thousands of years, men travelled away from their families under the hunter-gatherer system, which was a Walk-In-Walk-Out version of the Fly-In-Fly-Out and Drive-In-Drive-Out systems favoured by mining companies.
The difference today is the lack of social support networks available to the families.
That's according to CQUniversity Engaged Research Chair Professor Drew Dawson, who is Director of the Appleton Institute in Adelaide.
Professor Dawson notes that groups of men have been going off to garner resources for as long as human society can remember. He also says that face-to-face surveys have shown high turnover in mining jobs is often due to miners' wives being unhappy with the family circumstances.
The CQUniversity research leader made these comments while introducing his presentation titled Fatigue Management Technology: Analysis of the parliamentary enquiry into FIFO/DIDO submissions and the policy implications for the mining industry.
He delivered his presentation to the 3rd Annual Mining & Technology Summit* held in Perth recently, saying he wanted to provide a big picture overview of enquiry submissions and to suggest a balanced way forward that acknowledges 'we don't know everything'.
"Populist responses could actually bugger the industry and ruin the lives of many people around Australia," he says.
* CQUniversity was among a handful of platinum sponsors for this major summit.