Climate changes and global warming: implications for the strategic management of companies in the steel sector in Minas Gerais state

Abstract

The main purposes of this study are to identify the consequences of climate changes and global warming concerning the strategies put into practice by companies in the steel and metallurgy sector of Minas Gerais, Brazil and to understand how metallurgy directors face these questions. With the launching of the still controversial fourth Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Changes (IPCC), in 2007, doubts about this subject were reduced and debates intensified, reaching the governmental and business sectors. The quest is mainly exploratory, adopting, within a phenomenological perspective, a qualitative approach and using a semi-structured interview as a tool for data collection. The discourse analysis is adopted for data treatment, also with a phenomenological approach. The interview analyses show that climate changes and the global warming affect the strategic administration in the enterprises under study. The major effects are related to a strengthening of arguments and justifications, seeking changes in the production processes related to the environment and to the climate. The search for charcoal self-sufficiency by means of reforesting is the main theme to be dealt with here.