"This has got to change.”

This is what Ed Toms remembered saying as he viewed the devastation from the Brumadinho tailings dam failure in Brazil in 2019 from a helicopter.

At the time, Toms was the global director for mines, dams and hydropower for infrastructure consulting firm AECOM. He had spent the previous few years working alongside Brazilian authorities after the Fundão (Samarco) dam failure in 2015, which killed 19 people and devastated nearby communities.

Three and a half years later, it happened again. The Brumadinho failure was even more disastrous, claiming 272 lives and dispersing approximately 12 million cubic metres of iron ore tailings.

Toms met with local community members, discussing the effects of the tailings dam failure with them, and would continue to work alongside Brazilian authorities in developing protocols, assisting with auditing and working with prosecutors.

Toms spent a few more years in the industry; “then, I actually tried to retire,” he said, laughing.

That retirement was short-lived. In July 2025, a former colleague at AECOM reached out to Toms about a new opportunity to help out with global tailings management. “It caught me off guard,” he recalled.

In February 2026, Toms began a new position as the first-ever CEO of the Global Tailings Management Institute (GTMI), which was established in January 2025. Its main objective is overseeing conformance with the Global Industry Standard on Tailings Management (GISTM) that was launched in August 2020.

“It took a little time to wrap my head around what the institute is about,” he said. “But I’ve completely bought into the institute and its mission of zero [tailings dam] failures. It’s more a passion or a calling than a job.”

For Toms, “social issues are the top priority” for the GTMI. “My focus, personally and for the institute, is that we’re doing this to gain trust in the global community,” he said. “The only way we can [gain trust] is to show progress in what we’re doing and to be very transparent about what we’re doing and why.”

The GTMI recently formed its technical committee, whose main mission is to develop conformance protocols, oversee all technical issues related to auditing and certification, and provide guidance on the interpretation of the standard.

Toms said it is not the GTMI’s intention to revise the GISTM, but there have been many questions from those in the industry about how some of the regulations can best be implemented. “We may have to modify them to be easier to understand,” he said.

The institute is also looking to streamline dam auditing approaches, Toms said, noting that auditors are currently interpreting the standards differently. The institute is also creating a database system to receive and review auditors’ reports for compliance with the GISTM. “We’re trying to implement the standards consistently across the [global] market,” he added.

Toms is hopeful that the rest of the mining industry will catch up with those companies that have already adopted the GISTM into their operations. He believes it is going to take effort to get new companies to adopt the standard and become GTMI signatories, but he is confident more will join once they see the benefits of implementing the GISTM and being able to demonstrate responsible tailings management.

“It’s going to take the majors to join first, and equity partners and insurance companies are already supportive,” he said. “I think the industry, as a whole, will see the benefit and follow the path of the original signatories.”