28.12.2021 ANKARA
The Union of Chambers and Commodity Exchanges of Turkey (TOBB) President M. Rifat Hisarcıklıoğlu stated that banks have increased their loan interest rates extraordinarily in recent days. “The real sector taking giving everything and the financial sector taking all the profit is no basis for fairness. We expect our banks to be more conscientious,” he said.
TOBB Joint Council
Meeting was held at TOBB Twin Towers with the participation of Trade Minister
Mehmet Muş.
Hisarcıklıoğlu said
that as an institution, they have reached all the capillaries of the economy,
so that they can see the situation on the ground in the best way and identify
issues and problems.
Hisarcıklıoğlu stated
that they submitted nearly 200 proposals and requests to the government and
ministry during the Covid-19 pandemic, many of which were implemented, and that
the positive results of the support steps were also seen.
Hisarcıklıoğlu stressed
that they find the recent recovery of the extraordinary devaluation of the
Turkish lira positive and support every step towards stabilizing the markets.
“We believe that getting rid of the high interest burden, as well as ensuring
stability and predictability in financial markets, will be a major boost to the
growth of the economy. We are also pleased to see positive and concrete steps
taken towards the payment of private sector receivables pending in the public
sector.”
Hisarcıklıoğlu said
that all these developments have raised morale in the real sector and increased
their enthusiasm to work.
“Of course, there are
problems in some matters. In particular, we see that our banks have increased their
loan interest rates extraordinarily in recent days, despite the fact that
funding costs from the Central Bank have fallen to 14 percent. We hear that
some banks apply loan interest rates of 25-30 percent, or even around 35
percent to their credit deposit accounts. If we are going to grow our country's
economy and increase production, investment, employment and exports, we must
all put our hands up and make sacrifices. The real sector taking giving
everything and the financial sector taking all the profit is no basis for
fairness. We expect our banks to be more conscientious now.”
Hisarcıklıoğlu stated
that he believes it would be useful to continue the support steps for the
sectors most affected by the pandemic, especially the services and trade sector,
and who do not get enough share of the growth.
Hisarcıklıoğlu stated
that in order to sustain strong growth, the reduction in loan interest rates
and inflation, the stability of exchange rates and the fact that this can be
achieved again, as in the past, “We anticipate that financing costs can be
reduced permanently with the provision of stability in the markets. We believe
in the importance of your policies to support business, trade and exports. For
the first time with you, our share of global trade has risen above 1 percent,”
he said.
Hisarcıklıoğlu noted
that the desire of the United States and the EU to change the Asian dependent
resource supply model could quickly move Turkey to the position of reliable
supplier country by standing out in the global supply chain:
“For this, we need to
make plans for sustainable growth and high value-added production and exports
in 2022 and beyond while taking steps to strengthen stability. In addition to
the transformation of the global supply chain, green consensus and steps taken
within the framework of climate change also contain significant opportunities
and threats. As Turkey, we need to take the necessary steps quickly in order to
position our country and business world well in this new period. For this
reason, we should further tighten the public-private dialogue and position
ourselves among the winning countries in this process with common sense.”
- Minister of Commerce
Muş
Trade Minister Mehmet
Muş pointed out that as the Ministry, they attach great importance to
consultation with the business world in all processes related to commercial
life, and said that they try to quickly evaluate and finalize the requests
received during these consultations.
Muş noted that despite
the negative effects of the Covid-19 pandemic, Turkey's economy managed to
achieve high growth rates in 2021, “92 percent of the high rate of growth
realized was due to our net exports and our share of global exports increased
in 2021 with the weighting of the share of manufacturing industry and exports
in our economic growth.”
Minister Muş stressed
that they, as the Ministry, have put forward new visions and strategies to
support exporters.
Muş informed that they
have made support payments to more than 7,200 companies this year by continuing
the existing support for goods exports, and said, “The support budget we have
allocated to our exporters for 2022 is 5.2 billion liras. Hopefully, with the
effects of the pandemic diminishing, our exporters will carry out more
activities and we will support them more.”
Muş stated that the
ratio of exports to imports has been on the rise especially recently and that
the current account balance has been more positive.
Minister Muş pointed to
the level achieved in the provision of stability and predictability in the
economy with the steps taken in the last 20 years. “We will continue to work
as the government to protect and sustain this. Here, we expect support from
you business representatives for the continuation of this positive mood in the
economy after the currency fluctuation has been eliminated. We're all in the
same boat. We must put our hands together for the future of our country.”
“Yes, there has been a
cost increase due to currency differences, but there has been a loosening of
rates in the last period. As a result, there is a justified expectation that
prices will go down in our citizens. I expect this expectation to be met, and I
would like to reiterate that we are following the process closely. As the
Ministry, we carry out our audits in 81 provinces for all stages of the supply
chain, especially retail outlets. We will continue these audits in the coming
period.”
TOBB President
Hisarcıklıoğlu met with chamber/commodity exchange heads after the council
meeting.