The 2026 Sustainable Global Leaders Summit was held in Shanghai from October 20 to 22. At an industry forum themed "New Economic Landscape and New Chapter in Consumption," co-hosted by the World Gold Council and Sina Finance, Liu Qin, Member of the Party Standing Committee and Vice General Manager of Shandong Gold Group, attended and delivered a speech.
Development Overview
Shandong Province is a major province for gold resources and gold production, with its gold output ranking first nationwide for 51 consecutive years. As a key provincial-owned enterprise in Shandong, Shandong Gold Group currently has more than 30,000 employees and total assets exceeding 220 billion yuan, with gold output consistently ranking among the top in the country for many years. Since the "14th Five-Year Plan" period, Shandong Gold Group has cumulatively produced 334.8 tons of gold, generated 907.4 billion yuan in operating revenue, and achieved 21.5 billion yuan in total profit, firmly ranking among the top provincial-owned enterprises in Shandong and securing a place on the Fortune Global 500 for two consecutive years.
One: Optimizing Industrial Layout to Anchor Sustainable Development
Liu Qin noted that optimizing industrial layout is an important measure for gold enterprises to deeply participate in global industrial division of labor and cooperation. Shandong Gold Group adheres to a full-industry-chain development direction and advances layout optimization from three levels:
(1) Building a new development pattern of "deepening roots in Shandong, expanding across the nation, and going global." The Group resolutely implements the national resource strategy, actively engages in the new round of mineral exploration breakthroughs, carries out re-understanding of metallogenic theories and re-practice of exploration technologies, accelerates the cultivation of strategic key minerals such as gold, silver, molybdenum, copper, lead, and zinc, and promotes coordinated multi-metal development. In terms of international layout, the Group actively integrates into high-quality Belt and Road cooperation, continues to consolidate existing projects in Argentina and Australia, expands into new resource regions such as Ghana, Namibia, and Cameroon, and forms a resource allocation system of "adding a batch, exploring a batch, and reserving a batch." Since the "14th Five-Year Plan" period, the Group has invested over 4 billion yuan in exploration funds, added more than 1,300 tons of metal resources, holds over 340 mining rights, possesses more than 3,000 tons of gold resource reserves, and holds various mineral resources valued at over 2 trillion yuan.
(2) Creating a full-industry-chain value symbiosis ecosystem. As a leading enterprise in Shandong Province's gold industry chain chain-leader system, Shandong Gold has established a new full-industry-chain value ecosystem through strengthening, supplementing, and extending the chain, covering everything from geological exploration and mining to ore dressing and smelting, deep processing, brand retail, and financial services, achieving upstream-downstream coordination, internal-external enterprise complementarity, and symbiosis among large, medium, and small enterprises.
(3) Consolidating the core business and ensuring the preservation and appreciation of state-owned assets. The Group has established a diversified development strategy, consolidating and expanding its position as the chain-leader enterprise in the gold core business, optimizing advantageous businesses, increasing high-quality resource reserves, implementing a non-ferrous metals operation strategy focused on associated minerals, optimizing mining structure, and improving smelting efficiency. At the same time, it strengthens industry chain finance, trade, and other businesses, moderately develops derivative trading and gold leasing and other synergistic businesses, and forms industrial synergy effects.
Two: Strengthening Technological Empowerment to Forge Hard Power for Sustainable Development
Liu Qin stated that the history of gold development is both a history of human struggle to explore and develop underground resources and a history of technological iteration and innovation. Shandong Gold adheres to an innovation-driven strategy, with main measures including:
(1) Building a "123+N" innovation platform system. The Group coordinates and advances an integrated management mechanism for industry-university-research-application: led by a nationally recognized enterprise technology center, with academician workstations and postdoctoral research workstations as two wings, with three laboratories including deep well mining as carriers, and with 18 provincial-level or above science and innovation platforms as the foundation, it has built a "123+N" innovation platform system. Since the "14th Five-Year Plan" period, the Group has undertaken or participated in 21 national-level major science and technology projects, a year-on-year increase of 73%; has been granted 1,544 patents, with the total number of invention patents being 3.5 times that of the same period during the "13th Five-Year Plan"; and has cumulatively received 234 science and technology awards at or above the provincial and ministerial level. Many achievements have become industry standards and been selected as national demonstration projects, with some reaching internationally leading levels.
(2) Breaking through key technological bottlenecks. In response to industry challenges such as deep earth resource extraction, utilization of low-grade ore, and large-scale tailings consumption, Shandong Gold has achieved multiple breakthroughs: it pioneered the Jiaodong-type gold deposit metallogenic theory, guiding the discovery of the world-class Xiling gold deposit; set a domestic record for the deepest core drilling at 4,006.17 meters; overcame a series of world-class technical challenges in ultra-deep vertical shafts, leading China's metal mines into a new era of 2,000-meter mining; and independently developed full tailings short-process intelligent high-concentration backfill technology, building 8 backfill demonstration projects.
(3) Advancing digital and intelligent transformation. Facing the global mining industry's digital and intelligent trend, Shandong Gold promotes the deep integration of 5G, mobile internet, artificial intelligence, cloud computing, and other new-generation information technologies into the entire process of mine production and operations, vigorously advancing "mechanization to replace people, automation to reduce people, and intelligence to eliminate people." During the "14th Five-Year Plan" period, the Group has cumulatively invested over 1.9 billion yuan to promote intelligent construction: the mechanized operation rate of trackless mining has reached over 65%, the mechanized rate of loading and transport has reached 100%, and the automation rate of main fixed facilities has reached over 95%. It is the first among non-coal mining enterprises nationwide to achieve 100% full coverage of roof full-support in excavation engineering. The Group has formed a number of replicable and promotable typical application scenarios, pioneering a new operational model for intelligent construction in non-coal mines.
Three: Adhering to Green Orientation to Create a New Paradigm for Sustainable Development
Liu Qin emphasized that green development is the distinctive foundation of modern mine development. As early as 2010, Shandong Gold established the concept of ecological mining development, unswervingly following the path of ecological priority and green development. Core practices include: achieving a win-win in safety and environmental protection—since the "14th Five-Year Plan" period, the Group has cumulatively invested over 5 billion yuan in safety transformation costs, implementing more than 120 typical intelligent scenarios; promoting resource conservation and utilization—advancing the reduction and resource utilization of waste rock and tailings, and creating ecological restoration models; and implementing the dual-carbon strategy—optimizing energy consumption structure, promoting production process upgrades and equipment facility renovation, and steadily improving energy conservation and carbon reduction levels. To date, Shandong Gold has taken the lead in building a green mining group integrating green mines, green factories, and green exploration, with all its operating mines included in the national or provincial green mine lists.
Four: Bravely Shouldering Social Responsibility to Demonstrate the New Mission of Sustainable Development
Liu Qin pointed out that sustainable development is embodied in the organic unity of economic responsibility, political responsibility, and social responsibility. Shandong Gold actively fulfills its social responsibilities, with main achievements including: cumulative tax contributions of 19.7 billion yuan; driving social employment for tens of thousands of people; providing assistance to over 6,000 families of employees in difficulty; distributing over 30 million yuan in assistance funds; and social charitable donations exceeding 100 million yuan. The Group has established a corporate culture ecosystem with both "Shandong Gold" characteristics and a global perspective, unifying the "greatest concerns of the nation" with "the people's concerns," taking root in its host locations, basing itself in one region, and benefiting one area, actively participating in public welfare undertakings such as donating to education, flood fighting and emergency rescue, poverty alleviation, and rural revitalization.
Looking Ahead
In his concluding remarks, Liu Qin stated that the unprecedented changes of the century are accelerating, global industrial chains and supply chains are undergoing deep restructuring, and gold's strategic attributes, financial attributes, and safe-haven functions are becoming increasingly prominent. Shandong Gold will anchor its strategic goal of building a world-leading integrated mining group and accelerating its march toward becoming a world-class enterprise, forging its soul with responsibility, gathering momentum through the full chain, building its foundation with green practices, and achieving lasting success through innovation, working together with industry peers to advance the green, low-carbon, and high-quality development of the global gold industry.
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