BY M. NECATI OZFATURA
TURKIYE- Turkey has witnessed important economic developments in recent years. I would like to tell about some of these developments today:
Exports: Exports more than doubled from $36.2 billion in 2002 to $85.8 billion last year.
Production: Production has been growing steadily for 21 years.
Tourism: Money-wise, we are the number eight tourist destination country in the world, with $18.1 billion in tourism revenues. In terms of the number of visitors, we're number nine. And under our new master plan, the target is 65 million tourists and $85 billion in annual revenues by 2023.
Turkey's international exchange reserves as of last month totaled $105.5 billion. Turkey has experienced many crises over the last 84 years. If it hadn't been for those crises, Turkey's gross domestic product (GDP) would be threefold now.
Turkey's economy is the world's 17th largest. And it's no fantasy for us to rise to number 10, because political stability leads to economic stability, and economic stability leads to development.
Our foreign capital intake in 2002 was approximately $1 billion, and by last year this had skyrocketed to nearly $20 billion.
As for the budget deficit, it was YTL 40 quadrillion in 2002 but it fell to YTL 3.9 quadrillion last year, the smallest budget deficit in the last 30 years. Should political and economic stability continue after this year's elections, Turkey can achieve a balanced budget in short order.
IMF debt: Turkey has made concessions in exchange for each loan it got from the International Monetary Fund. In 2002 Turkey owed $23.5 billion to the IMF, but today it owes just 8.5 billion. But starting in 2009, we won't take any more loans from the IMF. In 2012, our debt to the IMF will be completely cleared.
Moreover, our Treasury gained $300 million thanks to the 76 million barrels of oil going through the Baku-Tiblisi-Ceyhan Oil Pipeline.
The latest report of the European Reform Center indicates that Turkey's full accession to the EU will make the Union more powerful. "Perhaps rapidly growing Turkey won't want to join the EU after 2015," it adds.
All this is very important, but progress is by no means limited to this.