İMSAD: We are in a process where it may be difficult to find direction

Türkiye has the capacity to meet the high demand from home and abroad.

Türkiye İMSAD came together with the sector stakeholders at the meeting where the world and Turkish economy were evaluated. Turkey İMSAD Economy Consultant Dr. Can Fuat Gürlesel said that there is a shrinkage expectation in the construction sector in Europe and the USA, and pointed out that a large part of the construction materials exports in Turkey cover these regions.

The “Sectoral Economy Agenda” meeting, organized for the first time by Turkey IMSAD (Turkish Construction Material Industrialists Association), was held online with the contributions of Demirdöküm and GF Hakan Plastik.

“There are many reasons that make the upcoming period uncertain”

Tayfun Küçükoğlu, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Türkiye İMSAD, started his opening speech at the event by saying, “We are in a period of great uncertainty ahead, where we may have difficulty finding our direction due to influences coming from both our country and abroad, our estimation power is difficult, and our ability to make projections by looking at the past is narrowed”, continued his words as follows:

“There are many reasons that make the coming period uncertain. For these reasons, we need to anticipate factors such as how the world economy will change and where its policies will evolve. On the other hand, it is extremely important how the economic policies and the election impact in our country will affect our economy and sector in the upcoming period. If we can anticipate all these factors and make our preparations accordingly, we firmly believe that we will make a greater contribution to both our industry and our economy.”

Record export

Pointing out that the construction materials industry is of strategic importance for our country due to its share in total production and employment, Tayfun Küçükoğlu said, “Our sector represents the industrial side of the construction industry and distinguishes itself from the contracting, architecture, real estate and technical consultancy sectors with its contribution to the foreign trade, employment and growth of our country. In this context, when we look at the export figures of 33.74 billion dollars in 2022, we see that we broke the export record of all time. Especially in the second half of the year, the recession concerns and the slowdowns in the markets prevented annual exports from reaching more than 35 billion dollars. However, looking at the whole of the 12 months, the export record has been broken since August 2013, when Turkey IMSAD Foreign Trade Index was started to be measured on behalf of our industry. In terms of capacity, the Turkish construction materials industry has the power and innovative understanding to meet the high domestic and international demand. For this reason, I would like to underline that our industry will come to a much better point in the coming period.”

“A shrinkage is foreseen in the construction sector in the USA and Europe”

Expressing his predictions about the world economy at the meeting, Türkiye IMSAD Economy Consultant Dr. Can Fuat Gürlesel said, “As we enter 2023, the struggle against issues such as high inflation, tight monetary policies, high cost of living and financial instability in the world economy came to the fore. In this context, at the end of the first 5 months of the year, we saw that the tight monetary policies implemented on a global scale yielded results, the energy crisis was resolved and inflation started to decline. However, despite these positive developments, the average worldwide in 2023 under economic growth is predicted. The construction industry is expected to shrink, especially in the USA and Europe. In this situation, we see the effects of the increase in housing loan interests and the decrease in the number of housing construction permits. The expectation of shrinkage in these regions, which cover a large part of the exports of construction materials in Turkey, creates a negative situation for the exports of our industry.

“Turkey’s economic growth is at the level of 4 percent”

Also conveying his analysis of the point of the Turkish economy, Dr. Can Fuat Gürlesel said, “Macroeconomic indicators show that controlled monetary/exchange rate policies are implemented in our country. As a result, the foreign trade deficit in Turkey increased to 120 billion dollars and the current account deficit to 55 billion dollars. However, despite the negative picture in question, economic growth remains at the level of 4 percent.