13.09.2018
In cooperation with DEIK, Kuveyt Türk organized an Algeria-Morocco-Tunisia Day. Ufuk Uyan, General Manager of Kuveyt Türk, said: “Trade volume of this country and this bank with the African countries grows year after year. Taking the strategic priorities of this country into consideration, we will expand the business we do in Africa, especially Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia.”
Expanding the pioneering participation banking services it has been providing at home to the international arena, Kuveyt Türk organized an Algeria-Morocco-Tunisia Day in cooperation with Dış Ekonomik İlişkiler Kurulu (Foreign Economic Relations Board – DEIK) which is the business diplomacy organization of Türkiye. Held at Fairmont Quasar Istanbul on Wednesday 12 September 2018, the event was attended representatives of Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia as well as many business persons and business representatives.
Delivering the opening speech of the event, Ufuk Uyan, General Manager of Kuveyt Türk, emphasized the friendship-based relations between Türkiye and the African countries and explained that business relations with said countries expand year after year. Pointing out that the total trade volume between Türkiye and 54 African countries reached US$ 20.6 billion, Ufuk Uyan said: “The expansion of Kuveyt Türk’s relations with the African countries included in the strategic target markets of Türkiye is very important to us. This bank’s business volume with said African countries expands day after day. The volume in question was US$ 300 million in 2016, it increased to US$ 400 million in 2017 and US$ 260 in the first half of this year.”
Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia enjoy the largest share
Emphasizing that this country’s volume of trade with the north African countries steadily grew to increase 40% in the last three years, Uyan said: “A look at the foreign trade trend of Türkiye with Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia indicates that it is in favor of exports. A similar trend is happening with this bank. Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia represent a total share of 32% for exports and 25% for imports in the total foreign trade volume between Kuveyt Türk and the African countries. And this is one of the most convincing indicators of these three countries’ importance in terms of foreign trade.”
Expanding our correspondent bank network in these three countries
Pointing out that they selected Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia as their strategical targets in 2018, Ufuk Uyan said that they increased the visits they paid to correspondent banks and businesses to expand their correspondent bank network in the countries in question and to increase their contribution to the foreign trade volume of Türkiye. Uyan added that in addition to foreign trade, they were ready to make commercial, financial and humanitarian contributions as a Turkish bank to the relations between these three countries and Türkiye.
Taking into consideration the strategical priorities of this country
General Manager Uyan explained they were planning to continue the country days by expanding their cooperation with DEIK which is in charge of the foreign economic relations of the Turkish private sector, and finished his speech as follows:
With reference to the strategical priorities of this country and the targets of its 100-Day Performance Program, we aim to make a humble contribution to the relations, foreign trade abilities and historical ties of Türkiye through events like this.”
Ümit Kiler, Member of the Board of Directors of DEIK, said in his opening speech: “One of the priority strategical targets of Foreign Economic Relations Board is to strengthen this country’s strongly anchored economic and business relations with North Africa. North African countries occupy an important position for Türkiye and are important business partners in terms of this country’s strategy for Africa thanks to their oil and natural gas resources on the one hand and being large and developing markets on the other hand. Total business volume between Türkiye and the African countries increased to approximately US$ 20 billion in 2016. It was only US$ 5.4 billion in 2003. We aim to increase the volume to US$ 30 billion in the near future. The activities performed to expand this country’s business relations with Morocco, Tunisia and Algeria, especially large scale construction projects, give Turkish contractors an opportunity to enter the construction market of those countries. In this context Turkish construction companies completed 295, 57 and 14 projects in Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia respectively in the period 1972 to 2017. “
The other speakers who delivered opening speeches on the Algeria-Morocco-Tunisia Day were Mourad Hraki, Commercial Attaché of the Embassy of the People’s Democratic Republic of Algeria, Mhamed Ifriquine,
Ambassador of the Kingdom of Morocco to Istanbul, and Hedi Malek, Ambassador of the Republic of Tunisia to Istanbul.