The miner, which has operations in Russia and Kazakhstan as well as West Africa, has earmarked US$4.8 million for the programme - up from US$3.9 million in 2018.

Nordgold, confirming two-thirds of its 8,000 total payroll participated in a development or training programme last fiscal year, now said it expects that total proportion to rise for the 2019 financial year.

Some major projects in the company's employee development programme this year include a further development of an e-learning platform to encourage increased participation; the establishment of West Africa technical training centres to further improve the current internal training courses; and the continuation of a structured training approach to employees of mining and mobile maintenance departments.

The gold producer launched a self-nomination programme in 2017 alongside a proactive training programme, and that has proved "hugely successful" for career development, officials said. In the 2018 year, about 3% of its workforce requested career development, with a significant number of those individuals going on to secure promotions internally.

"In 2019, My Career Path, [a] new e-tool, will be designed to transparently show career opportunities," the company said. "It will enable Nordgold's employees to see a variety of career paths depending on the starting and targeting roles."

Nordgold said that, on the employee wellbeing front, it invested US$1.8 million on programmes for social and living condition improvements at all of its mines in 2018.

Some of its primary projects in that time includes the renovation of the Bissa canteen and training room; construction of a new health clinic at Bouly; a new training facility at Taparko and Mosque at Lefa; refurbishment of the accommodation camp at Irokinda; a new canteen at Zun-Holba; a gym renovation at Suzdal and Neryungri; and a new cloak room with new laundry equipment at Berezitovy.

This year, its employee well-being programme earmark has doubled to US$3.6 million.