Turkish exporters hope to bring their trade figure with the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to $10 billion as commercial relations enter a new period following an official visit to the Gulf country by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.
Turkish Exporters Assembly (TIM) Chairperson Ismail Gülle told Anadolu Agency (AA) that the visit to the UAE was extremely productive, Daily Sabah reports.
"The agreements made in terms of export volume and this extremely positive bridge established with the business world, give us hope to bring the export figure to $10 billion in a very short time," he said.
Expressing that the UAE is an extremely important country in terms of both trade and the region, Gülle said that the visit of the trade delegation, made simultaneously with President Erdoğan, gained much greater traction after the recent developments.
Gülle said they met with a very sincere attitude in the UAE, adding that businesspeople are interested in the opportunities present in Turkey.
Gülle said the largest import item of the UAE is gold and jewelry followed by petrochemical products.
"Naturally, we see our chemical and jewelry industry here as very lucky," he said.
Gülle stated that although the foreign trade volume between the two countries did not work out in Turkey's favor in 2020, this picture was reversed in 2021.
Turkey's exports to the UAE rose from $2.6 billion in 2020 to $5.5 billion in 2021.
"This was a huge increase. At the same time, we had imports of close to $6 billion from this country," he said.
He said that the UAE makes $245 billion worth of imports from the world and buys a total of 1,275 types of products, while Turkey sells 980 of those products to the country.
"We can sell more products. I sincerely believe that this will be achieved in a very short time with the atmosphere we see in addition to the course of the ties. We, as the business world, will carry out studies that will make these relations more frequent and productive," Gülle explained.
