MÜSİAD SAMSUN GENERAL ASSEMBLY

26 JUNE 2021

Honourable Metropolitan Mayor,

Honourable Rector,

Honourable District Mayors,

Honourable AK Party Provincial Chairman,

Esteemed Presidents and Representatives of the Samsun business world, of the chambers, the commodity exchange and the NGOs,

My Esteemed Members of the MÜSİAD Board of Directors,

The former presidents of our Samsun branch,

The Esteemed President and Members of our MÜSİAD Samsun Branch,

Members of the MÜSİAD Women Committee, my Young MÜSİAD brothers and sisters,

Esteemed Members of the Press,

I respectfully greet you at our General Assembly; welcome, you have honoured us with your presence.

Distinguished Guests,

We work day and night, develop ideas and put them into practice in order to contribute more to our country's economy and to be even more beneficial to our nation. We travel inch by inch from west to east so as to be informed about every single point of our homeland and to touch more people. The day before yesterday we were in our provinces of Bandırma and Balıkesir, yesterday we were in Konya, and we held our general assemblies. Today we are once again happy to be in Samsun, one of the apples of the Black Sea's eye. Samsun also holds another special place for me: I both make investments here and my wife is from Samsun. In a sense, then, I too may be considered half a native of Samsun.

The economy of Samsun, the largest city of the Black Sea Region in terms of economy and population, has developed on the basis of agricultural production and the marketing of these products.

Close to %65 of the active population works in the agricultural sector. The fact that the Bafra and Çarşamba plains are Türkiye's most fertile plains after the Çukurova plain meets the region's demand for agricultural produce, and the export of agricultural products makes an important contribution to the city's economy.

While the agricultural sector ranks first among the sectors that make up the province's economic structure, the industrial sector, led by automotive spare parts, as well as livestock breeding and tourism, also occupy an important place.

The availability of road, sea, air and rail transport, and the fact that the province possesses the largest port of the Eastern Black Sea region, make an important contribution to the city's economy. Imports and exports can be carried out through the city's port with its broad potential.

Samsun, which has managed to preserve its growth potential in this period when exports have declined across the country, ranked 21st among the provinces with the highest exports, with exports of approximately USD 730 million.

According to the data for the first 5 months of 2021, Samsun increased its exports by %72 compared with the same period of the previous year and thus managed to reach an export volume of USD 472 million in this short time.

Furthermore, with its regional economic potential, its human resources and its tradition of trade fairs, Samsun has the qualities to be a national and international fair and congress centre.

In order to increase Samsun's share in the provincial and national economy still further, we as business people will do our utmost through new investments and by making maximum use of the existing potential.

My Dear Brothers and Sisters,

Esteemed Friends, my MÜSİAD brothers and sisters,

At the meeting I held on Wednesday with wide participation together with the esteemed economy editors of our press, we found the opportunity to explain our country's investment strategies suited to the new world order and our project for developing and branding cities through their distinctive values.

As you also know, in recent years Türkiye has not been going through a good period, particularly with regard to foreign direct investment. Within the commercial and economic activity that opened up after the pandemic, investment too shifted towards the developing countries, in parallel especially with the increasing money supply. The developed countries could not take the share they wanted from this pie. Our country, on the other hand, despite being in the upper ranks of the developing countries class and possessing quite favourable conditions in terms of investment components, could not attract the foreign direct investment it desired.

Investments made in Türkiye recorded a decline of 19 percent compared with 2019 and, at the point they have now reached, stood at USD 6.8 billion in 2020. In the last months of this year, unfortunately, we are seeing low figures. In other words, we see that investors have withdrawn from our country to a serious extent.

My Dear Brothers and Sisters,

The pandemic period is not one that will end from one day to the next. Even if the epidemic ends, it is clear that we will now move to a new economic order and new rules. We must now follow the new models of development and growth, that is, the new business development models of the new world order.

Investments must be attracted correctly and channelled to the right places, investors must be actively sought, and the values unique to each city of our country must be presented far better. This is possible only through a new investment network that is spread across every part of the world, that draws investment, production and trade intelligence from every point, that knows the investment environments and that establishes the system to bring investors together with companies in Türkiye.

We made a statement: we said that in the future it is not states but cities that will compete. For this reason the creation of regional and urban economies, that is, of city economies, is essential. In this way we will have cities that are self-sufficient and that have been able to turn their own assets into value.

The branding of cities and the conversion of their existing assets into value, that is, the proper identification of their potentials and the increase of the provinces' value through investments suited to those potentials.

Indeed, the data I obtained as a result of these travels, together with the experience brought by direct contact with you, turned into a project. Every city has its own distinctive values. Turning these into high value-added assets brands that city and increases its contribution to GDP. It consists of comparing our cities with their counterparts in the world that have similar characteristics, according to certain valuation criteria, and applying in our own cities the methods and processes of the added value produced by their counterparts around the world. Matching cities in this way is the basic starting point of the study. We named this study “Developing and Branding Cities Through Their Distinctive Values”.

Determining a correct industrialization policy in fact passes through finding, supporting, scaling up and strengthening the capital of promising companies that will sustain city economies, and through both branding cities and strengthening companies by means of a domestic and national production drive. I call this making city economies work for the execution of industrialization.

When we look at our province of Samsun, its GDP is USD 8.7 billion, while the brand province we have identified for Samsun is Hamburg, which is foremost Germany's largest port city and which has brought itself to the fore in the maritime sector, agriculture, automotive, aviation and medical fields and, with its universities, in biotechnology. Its GDP is USD 124 billion. Growing like Hamburg is possible only through determining the city's distinctive values together with every segment of the local administrations, bringing those values together with suitable investments and investors, continuously monitoring the efficiency of support and incentives, and branding that city.

Samsun, one of the distinguished cities of the Black Sea, possesses this potential in abundance.

My Dear Brothers and Sisters,

We in fact also regard our project for the development of City Economies as a road map for Türkiye in determining its new investment policy. Because carrying out the tasks I listed above will be possible only through an organization spread across the whole world, and there are counterpart institutions of this kind in the world.

The only capital organization that will support Türkiye's ability to do this is MÜSİAD. Because the organization that understands the language of both the industrialist and the SME, that develops projects, that is more dynamic with its renewed structure and that, through its widespread presence, can conduct commercial and economic diplomacy and investment diplomacy between the world and Türkiye most effectively is MÜSİAD.

The primary duty falling to us must first of all be a change of mentality. That is, to approach investment not merely as inviting companies from certain countries here as partners, but as promoting Türkiye as an investment market. And it must be to grow soundly the SMEs that are the locomotive of domestic production and, with the advantages of economies of scale, to bring them together with foreign partners and fund owners, that is, a kind of matching.

The MÜSİAD TIA (MÜSİAD TRADE and INVESTMENT AGENCIES) system, which we designed together with the Presidency Investment Office in order to promote Türkiye as an investment and trade market for foreign direct investors and to make MÜSİAD's international field presence work like a trade and investment system, will serve this purpose, and in this way it will both operate investment diplomacy and draw the active investment diaspora abroad to our country.

Distinguished Guests,

As you know, in order to prepare in advance for the new world system, as MÜSİAD we launched our Renewal process. Our motto at the outset was “Together”. Now we say “WE ARE HERE”. With the peace of mind of having kept the promises I made to you when I first took office and of having fulfilled this sacred duty as it deserves, we leave the word WE ARE HERE to the next term. For Türkiye, in production, in trade, in investment, in every field of society from art to culture, in mutual assistance, for the development and prosperity of our country, we say we are always here.

From the first day I took office until now, my dear brothers and sisters, I have believed wholeheartedly in this: no organization whose FIELD is not strong can stand, and one cannot be a good administrator without mastering the FIELD, that is, without direct contact with people. As you also know, MÜSİAD, with its widespread presence both at home and abroad, is one of the rare capital organizations in the world. For this reason, to see MÜSİAD merely as an NGO would now be an injustice to this structure's history, to its memory and to the services it has rendered on behalf of the country.

Particularly after the Renewal process, MÜSİAD is taking its place among the world's select organizations by arranging its own structure in the face of the new world order and by developing a distinctive management-organization model. My colleagues and I struggled for this throughout our term in order to reach something better, and we have no doubt that the brothers and sisters who come after us will take over this cause and this relay race in the same consciousness and with the same motto and carry it forward. Before the Renewal process MÜSİAD used the concept of organization. But now we command such a broad expanse that we have had to divide it into two brands, GLOBAL and YEREL, and of course the management model has changed as well. As for MÜSİAD's widespread presence, it was already long since ready and worthy of taking the name MÜSİAD FIELD. We arranged the system according to the new conditions and gave it a fresh spirit.

By simplifying our structure, we gathered the project-based committees under the roof of the MÜSİAD ASSEMBLY. The MÜSİAD ASSEMBLY is in fact an economic network in which the project, partnership, trade and investment demands and proposals of the whole country and of our networks abroad are blended together. You, that is, our Anatolian branches, will open your committees according to the appropriate and distinctive conditions of your cities and connect to the main committee at the Head Office and to the ASSEMBLY roof. The integration is continuing rapidly. The administration that comes after us will also continue this integration in order to strengthen communication and cooperation between the head office and the branches. Because this purpose lies at the foundation of the ASSEMBLY structure

We have fulfilled almost all the initiatives we planned and promised within the framework of our Renewal process. Now we are gathering the fruits of this process with our large-scale projects.

As MÜSİAD, we are developing projects aimed at increasing the contribution made to the national economy and at developing the culture of partnership among our members.

When each of our committees under the roof of the MÜSİAD ASSEMBLY was formed 2.5 years ago, that is, when there was neither an epidemic nor a crisis, we chose such strategic headings that, at the point we have reached today, the names of our committees correspond exactly to the headings of the projects and main working principles in the EU's new-period economic packages. This situation is proof of our vision, of our ability to read the future correctly and of the knowledge we draw from the field.

Our committees have begun to gather potential investors and industrialists in Anatolia around specific projects, with projects suited to their own thematic or sectoral fields.

These projects have begun to encourage the capital strength in Anatolia to invest in the projects or to become a partner in them.

For example, with our Investment and Production Bases Project we have created a model that, by building living and production zones in which all their needs are met in the same environment, will in time turn our small-scale companies, which struggle to produce in narrow spaces and therefore cannot reach scale, into institutionalized companies ready to move to organized industrial zones. We have completed the first prototype of this model, and construction of the second will also begin soon.

We must establish production bases for epidemics and disasters that are likely to recur. By establishing production bases, it becomes possible to protect companies, employees and production in cases of epidemic or severe disaster, and to keep them going without a full lockdown.

On the other hand, with our Smart Agricultural Cities Project we have launched an initiative to encourage rural development and in this way to support reverse migration and to achieve a homogeneous population structure.

We presented this to the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry as a model.

With the Smart Agricultural Cities Model, we have developed an initiative to encourage rural life and to support rural development, with opportunities targeting the population crowded into the big cities and especially the enterprises of women and young people.

Today many of our members in Anatolia are carrying out preparatory work to implement this initiative in their own regions.

Many more projects like these have been produced by our committees and spread to the grassroots.

Branding cities in the field of gastro-tourism through gastro-economy and Turkish Culinary Arts; establishing structures such as Caravan Tourism and Field Hospitals through multiple partnerships; creating a secure real estate buying and selling platform; and, in line with the 2023 targets, growing selected SMEs in 20 places and 23 locations to make them Turkish and World Brands. This and many other projects like it became the fruits of MÜSİAD's Renewal adventure.

God willing, through this integration process of ours in the branches, you will be the means by which our MÜSİAD is carried much further forward.

Distinguished Guests, Esteemed Friends,

Türkiye is a young and dynamic country. It proves this in the best possible way both during the pandemic period and with its growth in the post-pandemic period. While the developed countries struggled even in producing masks and disinfectant, thank God our companies, most of which are MÜSİAD members, immediately adjusted their production lines and carried out the production of the medical supplies, medicines and disinfectant needed for the country.

2020 became a year in which, after the first collapse in economic activity with the onset of the pandemic, Türkiye's recovery process was an example to the whole world.

Then we gradually began to recover, and this was reflected in our capacity utilization rates. Our manufacturing industry, for its part, settled into a notable course of development in the last two quarters.

However, we must certainly eliminate at the earliest opportunity the two fundamental factors that drive inflationary pressure here.

The first is self-sufficiency: that is, producing domestically the intermediate goods worth close to USD 175 billion that are imported, minimizing external dependence and, of course, giving up seeing money as a commodity instrument.

The second will be possible by providing resident savers with new and reliable investment opportunities in which they can put to use the foreign currency and gold they hold and the money they keep in interest or participation shares.

Establishing venture capital funds in which projects will be securitized, and encouraging production in Türkiye by strengthening the culture of partnership through these funds, must likewise be a matter with which we must certainly concern ourselves.

We can regard this %7 growth in the first quarter as a harbinger of the exit from the pandemic. Indeed, with the base effect, we may even see the second-quarter growth rate above %15. However, for this situation to be sustainable, it is necessary to achieve investment-production-trade synchronization and to set out production as the fundamental economic policy.

The inflationary environment we are currently in and the high credit costs show that we are still a risky area for investment.

Distinguished Guests, my MÜSİAD brothers and sisters

With only a short time left before I hand over the office, I hope, God willing, that I have fulfilled the duties incumbent upon me as they deserve and have not betrayed your trust. I chose to be a President who travels, not one who sits.

Contact with our members, consultation and fellowship with them, the constant hosting of the Anatolian branches at the Head Office and thus raising to the highest level the closeness between the centre and the FIELD have been my fundamental goal.

On this occasion I also ask you to forgive me any dues I may owe you. MÜSİAD is a school. It is a home. And we are marathon runners. I believe that the friends who will take over the office will make every effort to carry our MÜSİAD much further forward than we did.

As I conclude my speech with these feelings, I wish that our branch's general assembly may be a means of goodness; I thank Mr Haluk Tan, who is handing over his office at our Samsun branch, and the board of directors for their services, and I wish success to the gentleman taking over the office and to the board of directors; I pray to Almighty God that, through the work of the new administration, its contributions to the Samsun business world and to our country may continue to increase,

I thank everyone who contributed to this organization and greet you with respect and affection. May God protect you.

Abdurrahman KAAN

President of MÜSİAD