Turkey's reputation rose last decade, says Caglayan

Turkey's reputation has reached a desirable level over the last decade with its rapidly growing economy, the Turkish Economy Minister Zafer Caglayan said yesterday. "Turkey's reputation was eroding nearly ten years ago," said Caglayan, speaking at the "Turkey Reputation Index 2011" meeting in Istanbul. He said that Turkey's economy had developed to a significant extent, going from being a borrower country of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to an attractive market drawing foreign direct investments (FDI) from all around the world. "Turkey was seeking $1 billion from the IMF in previous years to pay the salaries of its public employees," said Caglayan, suggesting that international companies' confidence in Turkey rose as the economy started to prove its stability in 2003. The minister added that the total FDI to Turkey amounted to nearly $15 billion between 1923 and 2003, while the value of FDI attracted by Turkey was $108 billion in just the last nine years. "This shows the increasing reputation of Turkey and of Turkish firms," he said. "We are now planning our next 12 years, making projections to ensure that we become among the top 10 economies of the world in 2023," said Caglayan, emphasizing that the country's export volume would also reach $500 billion the same year, the one hundredth anniversary of the republic. Speaking on the new incentive law, he said the Turkish government aimed to support the private sector actors to make more investments and produce more through the incentives. "I was always proud of the fact that I had never benefited from state incentives in the last 28 years of my business life, but now I see that this was wrong," he said.