One of the most significant metal mining operations in Europe – it operates the largest open pit copper mine on the continent – Cobre las Cruces relies upon a highly regarded in-house legal team to safeguard its business. Lorena García de Izarra takes on direct responsibility for legal matters at the company in her position as general counsel, secretary of the board and compliance officer. Previously a private practice lawyer, she also had a three-year tenure in the public sector as legal counsel for the governmental administrator of Andalucía before joining Cobre las Cruces in 2011.

García is credited for developing safety issues at the company in conjunction with ecologists and beleives that the future of the legal function is to become even more integrated with the technical and engineering aspect of the company’s operations to provide more tailored legal advice: ‘I think the future of this general counsel and legal department is to understand the technical issues and be more connected with these. We are looking to consult with a group of engineers about this on a regular basis to achieve this’.