Turkey seeks to set up exclusive investment zone in Syria
Posted by meb at January 5th, 2008
A group of Turkish businessmen under the coordination of the Foreign Trade Undersecretariat will soon head to Syria to seek the establishment of an investment zone there, a zone that would exclusively be open to Turkish companies, State Minister for Foreign Trade Kürşad Tüzmen said yesterday. Speaking at the “Business and Investment Opportunities in Syria” meeting organized by the Turkey-Syria Business Council Friday in Ankara, Tüzmen said though just a year had passed since the free trade agreement came into effect, great progress has been achieved so far — bureaucratic formalities such as filling in statistics forms and getting approval for bills from the consulates are to be abolished shortly. At the meeting the minister reiterated Turkey and Syria’s goal of raising the trade volume between the two countries to $2 billion by the end of 2008, and to $5 billion thereafter. One step Tüzmen proposed to bolster the commercial relations was to create an “intermodal” transportation and logistics center among Turkey, Syria and Iraq to effectively meet the urgent demands of Iraq, which is suffering hard times amidst the ongoing war. He also called on Syrian officials present at the meeting to make more use of Turkey’s skilled and experienced contracting companies. In 2007 alone Turkish contractors completed more than $20 billion of overseas projects in almost all parts of the world, and the scope of their business is growing annually by more than 10 percent. “The procurement regulations in Syria are very troubling for our contractors,” he said, and went on to say: “But they are not deterring us. Our contractors will keep growing in the Syrian market and our exporters will increase the trade volume with resolve. If you provide us easier access to Syrian infrastructure projects, the world will follow.” Syria’s Deputy Prime Minister Abdullah al-Dardari, who has been in Turkey for two days for official talks, also spoke at the occasion where he said the relations between Turkey and Syria were very important for them and expressed his complete agreement with Tüzmen’s statements. He said there was a great economic change in Syria and that they were benefiting from Turkey’s experiences. Dardari said the private sector had an important share in the recent investments in Syria as he pointed out the capital inflow to Syria had increased significantly to reach $787 million in 2007. Syria’s exports increased to $12.5 billion last year, while nearly four years ago this number was just $5 billion, according to Dardari. He acknowledged the success of Turkish exporters and said they considered this as an opportunity for them to learn from experience and succeed. Meanwhile, Syrian Transportation Minister Yarub S. Badr visited Istanbul Seabuses and Fast Ferries Inc. (İDO) in İstanbul yesterday after the meetings in Ankara. Badr told reporters that the visit to İDO was a priceless experience for them.
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