Turkey’s Minister of Industry says economic confidence indicators are improving

Minister of Industry and Technology Mustafa Varank has made a presentation of the 2020 budget of his ministry in the Parliamentary Planning and Budget Commission. Pointing to a challenging global economic outlook, Varank said that a 3 percent global growth forecast was made for 2019, which corresponds to the lowest rate since the 2008-2009 global financial crisis.

The Minister went on to say, “Whereas Turkey faced serious external shocks not originating from its economic foundation, in August 2018. However we mitigated the impact of said shocks thanks to the coordinated and well-designed policies we applied

Developments in industrial production in recent years point to a positive trend. Industrial production which displays a recovery trend since the beginning of the year reached a positive level again on annual basis. Capacity utilization rates are increasing with the orders received in manufacturing sector and economic confidence indicators are going upwards. International organizations which painted a pessimistic picture for Turkey at the beginning of the year have started raising their growth forecasts one by one.

Varank stated that they had mobilized all opportunities for sustainable improvement in the industrial sector and that they accelerated the practices that will encourage growth, the principle of value added production to be of priority. He said, “We will achieve strong and sustainable growth rates with result-oriented policies. We have designed policies that will establish economic and technologic independence to carry Turkey to the forefront in the global race with a National Technological Breakthrough”.

Emphasizing that they will increase the share of manufacturing industry in exports and national income, Varank said that they aimed to increase the share of medium-high and high-tech products in exports to 50 percent.

The Minister stated that they had started the Technology-Oriented Industry Action Program to produce high value-added products with domestic facilities and capabilities and added that they observed intense interest in the machinery sector where the pilot application was implemented and extended the application period upon the demand of industrialists. Varank reported that they had been preparing to call for other focus sectors as of the first quarter of 2020.