Turkish Economy Until The End of 2019

We can count the year 2019 as the year of Turkish economic recovery after its recession and inflation in 2018 and earlier, the economy in Turkey in 2019 overcame the severe economic obstacles that hit the country starting with the fall of the Turkish currency and its loss of about 30% of its value against the US dollar.

By numbers: positive changes

 The indicators showed a positive change in favor of the Turkish economy, as the rate of inflation gradually decreased from 20.35% in January to 8.5% in October, and the economy moved from contraction to growth.

For the first time, the Turkish trade balance witnessed an annual surplus in June 2019 17 years ago.

The Statistics Authority reported that the value of exports in the first ten months of 2019 increased by 1.8% compared to the same period of 2018, setting records of 156 billion and 886 million dollars, and that the month of November alone witnessed an increase of 0.1% compared to the month Same from 2018, recording the value of exports amounted to 15 billion and 503 million dollars.

And the commission stated that Turkey’s imports in the first ten months fell by 11%, to settle at 183 billion and 686 million dollars.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was quoted as saying that Turkey “has become an important tourism destination in the world”, stressing that the number of tourists will exceed in 2019 (50) million. Tourism in Turkey is an important resource for the economy.

Expectations of international institutions:

All of the above made international economic institutions adjust their expectations towards the Turkish economy and tend toward positivity more in these expectations, as the International Monetary Fund expected the growth of the economy in Turkey at a rate of 3% instead of 2.5%, and he expected that the inflation rate will decrease to 12.6 instead of 14.1 in his recent estimates. .

As for the World Bank, it is expected that Turkey’s economy will grow by 3% in the next year, after it had expected a zero-growth rate in 2019.

The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development “OECD” expected the Turkish economy to grow in 2020 by 3% compared to 0.3% in 2019.

Turkish Central Bank:

The Turkish Central Bank played an important role in supporting the economy after the stability it achieved in the financial markets, by reducing interest rates last July by 1200 points, or an average of 12%, and thus the interest rate fell from 24% to 12%, which contributed in essence, it reduces inflation.

It is noteworthy that the start of lowering interest rates and then the decrease in inflation in the country came with the receipt of “Murat Uyisal” as the governor of the Turkish Central Bank.

In this context, the major international central banks in the world have cut interest rates several times during 2019 in order to support the economy, which reinforced the positive view of the Turkish economy in 2020, especially noting that the size of public debt is low in Turkey and that the country’s administration follows financial policies Extended contributed to the beginning of economic growth after the recession.

Visions for 2020:

These positive indicators give the follower confidence in a stable economic environment in 2020 after the package of reforms that Turkey started since the beginning of 2019, as it started this year to raise the minimum wage by 26%, and the government has worked to strengthen the Turkish financial position through measures, the most important of which are tax cuts and financial exemptions In conjunction with the steps of the Central Bank and some other sectors.

After the achievements achieved during 2019, the Turkish Economic Department aspires to further improvement, setting its goals to reduce the current account deficit in the national income during 2020 to 1.2% of the GDP after the deficit reached in 2018 to its lowest level in nine years.

It also aims to reduce inflation rates in the years 2020, 2021 and 2022 as follows: 8.5%, 6%, and 4.9%.

The reform program takes into consideration the issue of unemployment, aiming to reduce it to 12.9% in 2019, 11.8% in 2020, 10.6% in 2021 and 9.8% in 2022.

This reform program fought a fierce battle with economic fluctuations and implemented steady steps in light of external risks and internal challenges, proving that the Turkish economy is “not fragile” as stated by one of the United Nations officials, but it is a stable economy that can rely on itself in light of crises.