Critical Success Factors for the Iron and Steel Industry in Turkey: A Fuzzy DEMATEL Approach

The attempt to improve the efficiency and competitiveness of an industrial sector is aided by the determination of critical success factors (CSFs) which focus efforts in those areas that really affect the whole industry, thereby conserving limited resources. In this paper, a three-stage methodology is proposed to find CSFs for an industrial sector. The methodology specifies the interrelations between factors that shape the global competitiveness of a country as a whole and those that shape the competitiveness of the particular industry in question. It integrates a Web-based survey, a Delphi-type workshop, and a fuzzy decision making trial and evaluation laboratory model to highlight those CSFs upon which policymakers should especially concentrate in order to increase the competitiveness of a given industry. This methodology is then applied to a case study, identifying the CSFs of the iron and steel industry in Turkey. The results show that the burden of custom procedures, total tax rate, scope and impact of taxation, and solidity of banks are the CSFs for the competitiveness of the Turkish iron and steel industry.