CEO Chung Joon-Yang was elected the 37th Chairman of the World Steel Association (worldsteel) on October 6th at the 47th annual worldsteel conference held in São Paulo, Brazil. CEO Chung has become the third worldsteel chairman from Korea, following Chairman Kim Man-Je (20th, 1996~1997) and Chairman Lee Ku-Taek (31st, 2007~2008), and now leads 170 member steel companies worldwide as the chairman of worldsteel.
Korea is the fourth country to produce more than 3 worldsteel chairmen, behind Japan (9 times), the U.S. (8 times) and Germany (3 times). With this, Korea expects to strengthen its voice on major issues affecting the global steel industry as well as strengthen the status of the domestic steel industry.
CEO Chung Joon-Yang has been a member of the Executive Committee, the highest decision-making organization of worldsteel, since 2009, and was elected as Vice Chairman in 2012. Following his election as Chairman this year, CEO Chung Joon-Yang will hold the post for one year until the date of the next annual conference in October 2014.
The election of CEO Chung Joon-Yang as the leader of the global steel industry is testament to the latent strength underpinning POSCO’s success in achieving continuous growth despite the recent decline in the steel industry. Furthermore, the election reflects Korea’s ascendancy to becoming a steel technology export country from an importing country in less than half a century.
CEO Chung Joon-Yang was highly evaluated for his adroit understanding of steel technology having served as a steelworks head, his vast social network, and his activities as a member of the Executive Committee and as Vice Chairman, in which roles he has shown global leadership in many aspects including solving the current issues of the global steel industry and offering a sustainable vision of its future.
POSCO has been the subject of great interest throughout the global steel industry as a result of the company excelling its competitors by more than 5%p in terms of operating profit. Suffice it to say, World Steel Dynamics has selected POSCO as the ‘World’s Most Competitive Steelmaker’ for 4 straight years.
FINEX steelworks, which is a cutting edge steelmaking technology first to be successfully commercialized in 2007, has met with tremendous success in its export to China, strengthening POSCO’s position as a leading global steelmaker.
CEO Chung Joon-Yang, following his election to the post of worldsteel Chairman, commented, “I will focus on solving the various issues facing the global steel industry in my role as worldsteel Chairman through discussing and cooperating with all member companies. Furthermore, I will expand the association involvement of new rising steel companies from China, India, and South America for the balanced development of worldsteel as a whole.”
In his new role as worldsteel Chairman, CEO Chung Joon-Yang will give an opening speech at the China Automobile Steel Plate Seminar in Guangzhou, China, in October which is being hosted jointly with CISA. What’s more, he will carry out a range of activities to solve the steel industry’s current issues including △over-supply △raw material oligopoly △market development △competition with alternative materials.
At this year’s conference, Alexey Mordashov, Russia’s Severstal Chairman and former worldsteel Chairman, and Wolfgang Eder, Austria’s voestalpine Chairman, were elected as Vice Chairmen, and six companies including Italy’s ILVA S.P.A and 2 associations joined as new members.
The conference was attended by 300 representatives of the world steel industry with the item first on the agenda being an executive committee meeting and board of directors meeting held on the 6th. On the 7th and 8th, when the annual conference was held, presentations were made including vis-à-vis long-term sustainability and policy trends regarding the environment and climate changes. The presentations were followed by on-site plant tours in Brazil including that of ArcelorMittal on the 9th.