EXPO BRIEFING MEETING - PRESS MEETING

4 NOVEMBER 2020

Our Esteemed MÜSİAD Board of Directors Members,

Esteemed Members of Our Press,

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Welcome to our meeting, at which we will have a friendly talk specifically about MÜSİAD EXPO 2020; you have brought joy with you.

Distinguished Guests,

As you know, this year we are holding the 18th MÜSİAD EXPO.

As MÜSİAD, this year for the first time we will join forces with TÜYAP and hold our fair at the TÜYAP İstanbul Fair and Congress Centre on 18 - 21 November. At MÜSİAD EXPO, which we will hold in hybrid form, both physically and online, we are preparing to host hundreds of thousands of visitors. In addition, we are aiming for more than 8 thousand B2B business meetings. Our fair will host important meetings with the International Business Forum (IBF), which will be attended by industrialists and businesspeople coming from all four corners of the world. MÜSİAD is an association with contact points in 95 countries and therefore with a broad organizational network. Accordingly, we expect intense participation in the fair from abroad by ministers, senior bureaucrats, governors, members of parliament, mayors, chamber and commodity exchange presidents, foreign purchasing delegations, members of the press and distinguished businesspeople.

400 foreign purchasing delegations from 56 countries, notably Uzbekistan, Pakistan, Kazakhstan, Nigeria, South Africa, Iran, Iraq and Venezuela, will attend our fair.

Intensive talks with many chambers of commerce, chambers of industry, commodity exchanges and NGOs from abroad regarding participation in MÜSİAD EXPO are also still continuing.

The ‘MÜSİAD-World Honorary Consuls Trade and Diplomacy Summit’, which will bring together the honorary consuls who are regarded as important players in international trade, will also be held within the scope of the fair. Honorary consuls who play an active role throughout the world, notably in the regions of the United States, Europe and Asia, will contribute to the development of our country’s exports by sharing with businesspeople the experience and the accumulated knowledge they have gained there.

The participation of 82 honorary consuls in this summit has been confirmed.

As MÜSİAD, we have to date signed a total of 192 MoU Agreements with various institutions and organizations. At MÜSİAD EXPO 2020, by signing MoU Agreements with 20 new counterpart organizations from 4 continents,

we will have taken an important step towards the development of exports and of commercial relations between our countries.

Within the scope of the fair we will also hold the MÜSİAD World General Administrative Board (GİK). At the organization to be held with the participation of the MÜSİAD Branch Presidents and Representatives serving in Türkiye and around the world, we aim to develop the trading environment by strengthening the ties among MÜSİAD members.

The organization also has the quality of being a platform on which the things that need to be done in order to develop new commercial models, to sustain trade traffic in a healthy way and to reveal the trade potential of countries at the maximum level are shared.

Distinguished Guests,

Because of the pandemic that is affecting the world, the preparations for MÜSİAD EXPO are being made meticulously. MÜSİAD EXPO, which is preparing to be the largest fair event held predominantly physically since the pandemic, will this year offer a ‘hybrid fair’ experience for the first time.

At the fair, where we are preparing to host thousands of businesspeople and industrialists coming physically within the framework of social distancing rules, participants will be able to come together with fair visitors and trade not only in the fair area but even after the fair has ended, on a digital platform, thanks to the technological infrastructure provided by TÜYAP.

One of this year’s firsts at MÜSİAD EXPO will be the “Entrepreneurship Area”, which will be opened for the first time. Investments that have become an important strength of Türkiye and that have made an impact in the world will meet visitors in this hall.

At the organization that will bring investors and entrepreneurs together, it is aimed to make a direct contribution to employment in Türkiye by enabling the creation of new fields of business. We believe that the world’s important investors will attend the fair and hold important meetings in the entrepreneurship hall.

As you know, we as MÜSİAD are developing many projects in order to be able to contribute more to our country’s development and to our country’s economy.

We will share the details of these projects of ours, and some of them perhaps for the first time, with our visitors within the scope of the fair.

Differently at this year’s EXPO, caravans that will appeal to every income level will also find their place within the scope of EXPO in order to support Caravan Tourism. As you know, caravan tourism was put forward for the first time by MÜSİAD within the scope of our strategy of Developing New Tourism Resources and diversifying Tourism Investments, and it met with considerable demand on a very broad basis. And we too have given a place to Caravan Manufacturers at this year’s EXPO.

Apart from this, national electric vehicles will also be exhibited this year within the scope of EXPO. As MÜSİAD we are very happy and proud to give a place within the Fair to this initiative, which is a source of national pride for us.

Since there will be both physical and online participation at our MÜSİAD EXPO fair this year, we expect hundreds of thousands of visits to take place. This year’s fair will host approximately 8 thousand bilateral business meetings.

Hundreds of companies from 24 sectors will take part in the fair. The fair is attracting intense interest from abroad in terms of visitor and stand participation. There will be stand participation at the fair from many countries, from Venezuela to Uzbekistan, from Indonesia to Germany and Pakistan, while in terms of visitor participation there is intense demand from Europe, Asia-Pacific, Eurasia, Africa and the MENA countries.

Distinguished Guests,

Once again I would especially like to state:

Because of the Covid-19 Pandemic, which has caused a global crisis, this year we are carrying out the preparations for MÜSİAD EXPO meticulously, in accordance with all pandemic measures and with the standards of the TSE Covid-19 Safe Service Certificate.

We will carry out every organization of ours and every step of ours within the scope of the fair without disregarding in any way the Mask, Distance, Hygiene rule; we have taken all our precautions for this. All participants and visitors will be able to enter after careful checks, and contactless technologies will be made available in the fair area. Special teams will be on duty for density control and disinfection procedures.

Distinguished Guests,

As I complete my words, I would especially like to emphasize one issue:

MÜSİAD EXPO, which will be a means for our country’s businesspeople to develop their business by making contact with the whole world in the fields of production, trade, exports and investment, is an extremely important organization in such a difficult period as the whole world is going through.

There are no words to describe the happiness we feel at organizing such an event. This happiness is the happiness of being useful to our country and of proving to the whole world, as MÜSİAD, our faith in these lands.

I hope to see you again at our EXPO fair, for which we are now counting the days and preparing with great excitement, and I greet you all with respect and affection.

Abdurrahman Kaan

President of MÜSİAD