Percepção da população de Juiz de Fora sobre as mudanças climáticas e sua relação com o ODS 11

Abstract

It is a consensus among the scientific community to attribute direct influence on the Earth's climate to human activities. Melting glaciers, rising sea levels, torrential rains, desertification and impacts on food production are some of the consequences already observed as a result of global warming. Mitigating the impacts resulting from climate change is, therefore, an urgent duty for administrative managers, companies and citizens. The premise for carrying out this research is that the population's perception of global warming and its relationship with Sustainable Development Goal 11 – Sustainable Cities and Communities - can directly influence personal attitudes and determine the proposition of new public policies and educational actions to guarantee sustainable urban development, mitigating the effects of ongoing climate change. Therefore, the main objective of this study is to analyze how the population of Juiz de Fora perceives the climate crisis, municipal actions to make the municipality sustainable and the need for behavioral changes to promote sustainable urban development. To this end, a field survey was carried out, through the application of a structured questionnaire containing 27 questions for participants to express agreement or disagreement in relation to the proposed themes, using a 7-point Likert scale. The sample results indicated that the majority of the 169 respondents: completely agree with the occurrence of climate change; considers to have sufficient knowledge on the subject: believes in its potential to cause harm to present and future generations; confers mutual responsibility to mitigate its impacts on governments, companies and consumers; negatively evaluates the public service systems of the municipality of Juiz de Fora in relation to sustainability; they separate trash and share information or news in defense of the environment. Statistically significant differences were observed between responses according to gender and education, with women with a higher level of education showing greater environmental perception. In this sense, it is believed that education for sustainability presents itself as an essential action strategy to guarantee the quality of urban life in the face of climate change, combined with technological innovations and new behavioral and administrative practices.