MÜSİAD 2021-2023

BOARD OF DIRECTORS, TARGETS, ACTIVITIES

INTRODUCTION MEETING

09 November 2021, MÜSİAD Head Office

Esteemed Members of our Board of Directors,

Esteemed representatives of our press world,

On behalf of the MÜSİAD Board of Directors, I respectfully greet you all. Welcome to our meeting.

At our 26th Ordinary General Assembly, which we held on 11 September 2021 with the participation of our President, I took on the duty of the 7th Presidency of MÜSİAD through the goodwill of our members. I thank all our members who deemed me worthy of this duty. Throughout my term of office I will work with all my experience and energy and with all my strength for our members, our country and humanity.

Of course we will carry out this process by working in harmony together with our board members, our domestic and international branch presidents and our members.

In all our activities we also wish to see you, our esteemed members of the press, alongside us. Your views and suggestions are important to us. On behalf of all my colleagues I thank you once again for your participation.

Today I would like to convey to you our 2021-2023 targets, our activity plan and our strategy. Following our General Assembly, we held meetings with our Board Members, our presidents and all our stakeholders, determined our targets and formed the strategies that will take us to these targets.

Esteemed Members of the Press,

As MÜSİAD we have been advancing for 31 years, drawing our strength from our members. We opened our branches and contact centres at great speed, and we continue to open them. We have reached 88 branches at home and 81 contact points in 74 countries abroad. With our 11 thousand members and 60 thousand companies operating in different sectors, we provide employment for 1 million 800 thousand people. With the added value we create, we are giving direction to the development of the Turkish economy.

As MÜSİAD, we are a large family whose members are spread to the four corners of the world. It is with this strength that we grow, and with the inspiration and synergy we draw from our values we are building both our today and our tomorrow.

Our MÜSİAD is a hearth, a school, a voluntary formation. And our door is open to everyone who wishes to serve our country and our people…

In the coming period, by combining our past experience with today's innovations, we will carry Türkiye to entirely new horizons with the principle of ‘High Morality, High Technology’.

First of all, I would like to present to you the Vice Presidents who have taken office on our new board of directors;

Mr Gökhan Yetkin, Mr Mehmet Develioğlu, Mr Soner Meşe, Mr Ahmet Doğan Alperen, Mr Muhammed Ali Özeken and Mr Davut Altunbaş….. and with our entire board of directors, consisting of a total of 50 people whose names and titles you see on the screen,

our enthusiasm, determination and resolve to carry further this flag that we have taken up are complete.

Esteemed Members of the Press,

With the synergy of our new board members, of our sector boards and of all our commissions, we will develop projects that will add value to the Turkish economy. As of today we have left behind our 58th day in the new term. Within the scope of this process we held broad consultation meetings with all our boards and prepared our strategic action plan for the new term.

We then paid courtesy visits to the Speaker of our Grand National Assembly of Türkiye and to 13 ministries. Meeting with various non-governmental organizations, we focused on collaborations, on developing projects on a national and global scale and on conveying our future projection to different segments of society.

We have planned/are planning many special events in the new term. I would like to speak briefly about three of these events that we will hold before the end of the year:

  • This weekend, within the scope of the 25th International Business Forum, we are going with 3 private aircraft and more than 500 businessmen to Baku, the capital of the friendly and brotherly country Azerbaijan. With a delegation of more than 1,000 businessmen, formed with the participation of our international branches and of the representatives of the other stakeholder countries that are members of the forum, we will practically land in force on Baku. At this event, which will last three days, we will in particular discuss the infrastructure and superstructure investment opportunities and the commercial collaborations to be realized in Karabakh, which has been liberated from occupation.
  • We will hold our General Administrative Board meeting with the participation of our branch presidents

in Bursa on 3-4 December. There, together with guests who are experts in their field, we will put the topic ‘Green Transformation in Automotive Technologies and the Supply Industry’ on the table.

  • Then, on 22 December, at the İstanbul Haliç Congress Center, we will hold our Visionary'21 event, the fourth of its kind.

At this event of ours, with the motto ‘NOTICE IT’, together with our guests who are experts in their field we will say THE DIGITAL ,THE ENTERPRISE, THE CLIMATE, THE TRANSFORMATION, THE VALUES / NOTICE IT.

MÜSİAD has a very important mission not only in Türkiye's economic and social development but also in its becoming a global player. In line with this mission, in the new term we will give support to every effort that will contribute to Türkiye's development and raise the welfare level of our people.

As MÜSİAD, we are working to announce to the whole world ‘Türkiye's producer identity, its value-added strength and its innovative growth drive’, and we will continue to work with great enthusiasm.

With the aim of providing added value in every respect to Türkiye's domestic and national production power, we have structured our projection for the new term under seven main headings.

We can summarize these items as follows:

1- Strengthening MÜSİAD offices in all of the G20 countries

and increasing commercial diplomacy,

2- Establishing the Gulf Businessmen Liaison Office,

3- Organizing at least one MÜSİAD Expo Fair abroad,

4- Establishing the MÜSİAD International Arbitration Centre,

5- Supporting micro exports and, in this direction, the logistics,

human resources and payment systems infrastructure processes of each of our members

being strengthened,

6- Bringing ambassadors and commercial attachés together, through economic diplomacy activities,

with the business people in Anatolia,

7- Establishing the MÜSİAD Trade Office (MTO),

Esteemed Members of the Press,

With the inspiration we draw from our domestic and national production power, our vision of quality service, and our entrepreneurs and investors who accomplish world-class work in almost every field from automotive to food, from health to construction and from tourism to logistics, we are designing business models that will be an example to the world.

Of course, what we will do in the new term will not be limited to these items. We will continue our culture and art activities with various events lasting throughout the year under our MÜSİAD ART brand.

In addition to all this work, we will continue to support the projects of Young MÜSİAD and MÜSİAD Women. In order to raise the generations that will be the pioneers of this world in the future, we sowed seeds with Young MÜSİAD. Over the last 20 years these seeds have sprouted, put out shoots, grown strong and have now begun to stand on their own feet.

This term will be one in which every young person in whom effort has been invested will contribute in many ways to economic employment. Concentrating on international organizational work as Young MÜSİAD and increasing the number of MÜSAD Women members across Türkiye are among our priority targets for the new term.

Esteemed Members of the Press,

Following the Covid-19 pandemic, we are witnessing a period in which extraordinary developments are taking place all over the world in every field, from the economy to social life and from foreign policy to security. Looked at from this perspective, Türkiye has recorded significant progress over the last 20 years in many fields, from transport to energy and from foreign policy to national defence. In particular, with the rational investments made in the field of health and with the great transformation, it became one of the countries that managed the Covid-19 pandemic best in the world. In this period, when even developed economies experienced great difficulties, Türkiye succeeded in keeping the impact of the pandemic on the economy limited.

Although the economic contraction experienced globally affected all countries negatively, the Turkish economy reached a total export level of USD 181.8 billion in the January-October period of 2021.

In October, with exports of USD 20.8 billion, the highest monthly export figure in history was achieved. I would like to remind you that in the newspapers dated 02 January 2003 there was news saying: ‘’ Despite the continuation of political instability and economic fragility, Türkiye broke a record in exports in 2002. Türkiye's total exports reached USD 36 billion 205.1 million with an increase of 16.6 percent compared with the previous year.’’

The total exports for the last 12 months of 2021 exceeded USD 215 billion.

As MÜSİAD we believe that the Turkish economy, particularly with the increase in service exports, will exceed the export target of USD 250 billion in 2023.

We even consider it perfectly possible for this figure to rise to the level of USD 300 billion. To this end, within the scope of the special research we carried out with MÜSİAD member exporters, we determined 3 basic strategies.

These strategies are;

  • To give weight to strategies aimed at the export of value-added, high-technology products,
  • To focus on international logistics centres and, within this scope, to strengthen every kind of infrastructure process,
  • To support e-exports and micro exports.

Esteemed Members of the Press,

Thanks to its competitive and high-quality production power, the technical infrastructure it possesses and its qualified workforce in different sectors, Türkiye is advancing towards a far brighter future than today.

In order for our exports to record a permanent increase, for us to acquire the character of a country that gives a foreign trade surplus, and for sustainable growth, we are candidates for all possible new export markets, from Europe to America and from Asia to Africa.

For this reason, as MÜSİAD we have also given weight to our commercial diplomacy work. Because every new relationship we have established and will establish will be an important gain for our business world.

Within these 58 days;

-We brought Pakistani business people together with Turkish business people.

-Indonesian and Turkish business people came together within the framework of the B2B meetings held at MÜSİAD, and we signed new partnerships.

-With the opening of MÜSİAD Berlin, we brought Turkish and European business people together under the roof of MÜSİAD.

As I mentioned a little earlier, we also have our programmes in BAKU at the weekend.

Apart from all this, e-commerce-focused activities also occupy an important place on our agenda. It has been clearly seen that the digitalization process triggered by Covid-19 has transformed all industries.

The e-commerce sector, which is growing rapidly around the world, has an important place in all our lives. In 2020 the world retail e-commerce volume increased 15-fold over the last 10 years and was realized as USD 4.2 trillion.

It is a fact that as Türkiye we have not benefited sufficiently from this huge pie. Yet our country has many advantages for e-exports.

If we list these under 5 headings:

  • Our country's geo-strategic position,
  • Its young population approaching 30 million,
  • Its stable political structure in its region,
  • Its potential to address a market of 1.6 billion people and a Gross National Product of USD 28 trillion within a four-hour flight distance,
  • Its possession of industrial and commercial cities that carry out exports of over USD 1 billion.

If we can manage these advantages correctly, we believe that as a country we can reach a very different position in e-exports.

Esteemed Members of the Press,

One of the most important issues occupying Türkiye's agenda is the interest rate cut decision… Interest rates have two aspects. The return aspect and the cost aspect. The aspect that concerns the industrialist is the cost aspect, that is, loans. Therefore high interest rates cause production costs to remain high and cause inflation to come out high. As an association of industrialists and business people, this is the part that concerns us more. The more interest rates fall, the more production costs will fall by the same amount, depending on the easing of loan interest rates. This will also contribute to a fall in inflation. In this context, as MÜSİAD we support the lowering of interest rates, which we see as the greatest obstacle in front of investment, production and employment.

Alongside all this, our employees working under better material conditions, leading their lives in a more prosperous way and having greater purchasing power will please us as employers at least as much as it pleases them. In this context, we believe that the minimum wage increase to be determined for 2022 must certainly be above the year-end inflation rate, by way of reducing part of the minimum wage tax burdens on the employer.

Making this structure sustainable is one of our most important missions, as much as building a quality production and service infrastructure. With the synergy of the companies that are members of MÜSİAD, we are taking important steps in order to support sustainability at every stage, from production to the service network.

The Paris Climate Agreement, with a series of practices within the scope of combating the climate crisis, places important responsibilities on our business world. Within this scope we have two basic targets as MÜSİAD: the first stage is to support sustainability in every field… The second stage is to be the pioneer of projects aimed at reducing the carbon footprint that may arise in the production chain in every sector, from automotive to food, from transport to energy and from ready-made clothing to agriculture…

We will support to the very end the green development revolution that gives direction to the use of various technologies such as seed improvement, irrigation and fertilization automation, smart fertilizer management, precision spraying and traceability software, with the aim of obtaining more produce especially in the agricultural sector.

Esteemed Members of the Press,

We are advancing with sure steps towards our target of a stronger, more sustainable, more productive and brighter Türkiye. With our production-oriented sectors, our technological breakthroughs shaped by the Industry 4.0 vision, our entrepreneurs and investors who place advanced technologies such as artificial intelligence, augmented reality, big data and virtual reality at the centre, our employment power made up of our qualified and educated young people, and our women who provide added value to business life, we are walking towards a far more comfortable and brighter future.

As MÜSİAD, we wish our citizens to turn to different vocational and technical training courses and, by developing themselves, to provide added value to the economy. With the aim of contributing to this, we are working on a comprehensive education report that will identify the need for vocational and technical training in different sectors. We believe that the need for qualified “intermediate staff” can be met by accelerating and expanding this kind of training.

Most of our infrastructure and superstructure investments that are necessary in order to carry Türkiye to a better future and at the same time to be able to have a say politically and economically in the world;

such as motorways, bridges, universities, hospitals, dams, renewable energy production resources, natural gas and nuclear power plants, have been completed, and the rest are being completed rapidly.

A far brighter future awaits our young people, who are the children of today and the business people, academics, entrepreneurs and investors of tomorrow.

We believe that in all the work we will do we must bind ourselves more tightly to one another by bringing to the fore not our differences but what we have in common. If as a society we act as one and together, we can make our beautiful country stronger in every respect.

Türkiye with a strong economy will be the greatest pioneer of the rebuilding of a world in which rights and law, justice and equality, peace and trust, prosperity and happiness prevail.

Esteemed Members of the Press,

On this special day on which we have shared our future projection, we extend our thanks to everyone who is together with us. From now on, we hope to come together more often with you, our esteemed members of the press.

Hoping that our New Board of Directors and our targets will be beneficial above all for our country, for our business world and for MÜSİAD, I respectfully greet you all.