Minister Bolat meets with Turkish businesspeople in London

Minister of Trade Ömer Bolat stated at a meeting held at the Yunus Emre Institute in the capital London that he was in the country upon an official invitation. Bolat expressed that in addition to his bilateral meeting with UK Secretary of State for Business and Trade Kemi Badenoch, he also came together with Turkish and British businesspeople at a roundtable meeting.

RELATIONS CAN BE DEVELOPED FURTHER

Stating that the relations between the two countries are quite good but could be improved in sectors such as tourism, finance, and many others, Bolat said that the current Free Trade Agreement (FTA) between the countries mainly covers industrial products, while areas such as iron, steel, and agricultural products remain outside the scope of the agreement.

Reminding that despite this, the agreement is progressing very well and the trade volume between the two countries is approaching 19 billion dollars, Bolat said, "This is a good figure. Within this, 12.5 billion dollars is our exports. We are able to provide a foreign trade surplus of 6 billion dollars."

MUTUAL CONCESSIONS CAN BE MADE

Bolat stated that education, health, logistics, transportation, finance, telecommunications, and joint investments are on the agenda for the updated FTA, and that both countries have made proposals regarding some mutual concessions on agricultural products.

Stating that they have announced to the public that Turkey and the United Kingdom decided this morning to start negotiations on updating the FTA, Bolat said that the first round of negotiations will be held in the week of June 10.

Bolat shared the information that the relationship between the two countries in the tourism sector is also at a good level and that 3.8 million British tourists visited Turkey last year.

SHARED LATEST DEVELOPMENTS

Explaining the latest developments in the Turkish economy to the businesspeople and NGO representatives at the meeting, Bolat said that Turkey's national income reached a historic figure two weeks ago and exceeded one trillion dollars. Stating that Turkey's goods exports also rose to 256 billion dollars, Bolat said, "Our target this year is 267 billion dollars, meaning to increase our goods exports by 4 percent."

Expressing that Turkey is a services country like the UK, Bolat shared the information that the total services revenue is 100 billion dollars, of which 54 billion dollars is from tourism, 40 billion dollars from logistics, 2.5 billion dollars from health, and 800 million dollars from education, and used the expressions, "We are targeting 110 billion dollars in services exports this year."

"CURRENT ACCOUNT DEFICIT WILL DECLINE"

Noting that Turkey's current account deficit continues to decline, Bolat stated that the February figures will be announced in April and that the current account deficit is expected to fall to 31-32 billion dollars, and to drop below 30 billion dollars in the March data.

Bolat added that in the medium term, Turkey's current account deficit will decline to a reasonable level.