CAPITAL GOODS INDUSTRY IN BRAZIL UNDER A SYSTEMIC PERSPECTIVE: Challenges and Strategic Agenda

The capital goods industry is the great responsible for the technological diffusion in the industry in general. A well-developed capital goods sector means quicker access to new technologies and, consequently, a greater efficacy of the industry. Therefore, the capital goods industry acts like a propeller towards the national economic development. This sector is fundamental to boost the national industry and economy, thus being among the strategic sectors of the national policy for industry, technology and foreign trade (PITFT). The importance of this sector justifies a study of which challenges are being currently faced and which strategic agenda might be proposed to allow the national capital goods industry to overcome these challenges and to help strengthen the local industry. As a means of achieving the expected results, this work conducted a survey on the capital goods sector in Brazil by specifying its current situation. A macro-environmental analysis was performed based on a systemic approach by using the Soft Systems Methodology (SSM) to better understand the problem faced by the sector. As the main result, one can highlight that it is important for the sector to reduce its dependence on palliative measures by the government. To achieve this, it is necessary that the sector strengthens itself. This strengthening can be achieved by means of long-term governmental measures (that are beneficial to the sector) rather than the current short-term measures. These long-term measures would include improvement of the infrastructure to decrease the production costs as well as modernisation, innovation and technological improvement of the capital goods industry, enabling the sector to be more competitive by manufacturing cheaper and better quality products.