Turkey’s automobile exports increases by 77 percent despite slow market

While automobile exports in the first five months of the year increased by 77 percent compared to the same period of 2016, the market continued to shrink. According to the Automotive Industry Association (OSD), total automotive production in January-May increased by 22 percent compared to the same period in 2016 and automobile production increased by 41 percent. In this period, total production amounted to 728 thousand and automobile production amounted to 507 thousand units. In the January-May period, the total market shrank by 9 percent to 325 thousand units. In this period, the automobile market shrank by 10 percent and became 240 thousand units.

In the mentioned period, while production figures in the commercial vehicle group and the light commercial vehicle group decreased by 6 and 7 percent respectively, heavy commercial vehicle group saw a production increase of 12 percent. In the same period, while the market for commercial vehicles contracted by 4 percent, both the light commercial vehicle group and heavy commercial vehicle group suffered a decline of  3 percent and 19 percent respectively.

Exports increase by 54 percent

While automotive exports increased by 32 percent on unit basis, compared to the same period in January-May 2016, automobile exports rose by 54 percent. In same period, total exports amounted to 598 thousand and automobile exports amounted to 425 thousand units.