IMFpraises Turkey over unemployment rate

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) pointed to the large employment losses which has led to sharp increases in unemployment rates after 2008, saying, "By 2012, most countries had unemployment rates well above their pre-crisis levels, with the exception of Macedonia, Turkey and some CIS countries" in a recently published report entitled "Faster, Higher, Stronger – Raising the Growth Potential of Central, Eastern and Southeastern Europe (CESEE)" under its "Regional Economic Issues" series. It was indicated in the report that the drop in the working age population in the Central, Eastern and Southeastern European countries would be another headwind for potential GDP growth, but Turkey would be an exception. "In the period between 2010 and 2025, the decline is expected to be especially large in Ukraine, Moldova and Bulgaria. The only country where the working-age population is still expected to grow significantly is Turkey," the report said. Also touching upon the issue of credit supply, the report said that credit supply was constrained by the large stock of non-performing loans (NPLs) in the Central and Eastern European countries and that NPL ratios have risen sharply in many countries with the notable exception of Turkey since the onset of the crisis and reached an average of 14 percent in the region.