Barbara Walters chats with Forward Syria
Swaying between art and seduction
Discussing monetary policy with the man in charge
Where the earth screams in horror
08/03/2010 - Issue 42
Syria and Turkey: Strengthening ties
by Stephen Starr
In Aleppo, Ali Turkmani says his company has never been doing a better trade.
Syria’s northern neighbor has been plenty responsible for that. “Relations between people were always good but since the politics has improved between Turkey and Syria, the trade situation has followed,” says Turkmani, who owns companies importing items for the Syrian traffic police through his company Affak for Fairs. “Now most businesses in Aleppo have links to companies in Turkey.”
Syria’s Stabilization and Association Agreement with the European Union, fell through last October, and Turkey, to a large extent, has picked up the slack. Political reverberations in the region now mean that Turkey is looking to move away from established business partners – namely Israel – and on to markets that offer straightforward business and trading opportunities.
Dedeman, a Turkish company, bought Syria’s first five star hotel from Le Meridian group in 2009. Today, Turkey is on the way to becoming the major regional player with Syria set to be the biggest beneficiary of this. Its membership of NATO and the presence of the Incirlik American military base located close to the Syrian border in Adana have made it a legitimate friend of the west.
Turkey has completed a turnaround that began in dramatic fashion at the World Economic Forum in Davos in January 2009, and followed up through the tough comments by Prime Minister Erdogan following the attack on a Turkish aid boat heading for Gaza on May 31st. Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has been to Istanbul several times in recent months while Turkey’s Foreign Minister, Ahmet Davutoğlu, has called for multi-state free trade zone to be set up, something that would result in a major increase in the amount of logistics and transportation traffic across Syrian territory.
With a population of almost 73 million and a median age of just 27 years old, Turkey is clearly a market Syria can look to as a bounty.
In Damascus, Turkish business fairs are as popular as their products in the market. The Turkish Textile EXPO 2010 (last June), the Turkish Exhibition on Building 2010 (this coming December) and under way right now, the Exhibition of Turkish Clothes 2010 are wooing and educating in equal measure.
Mohammad Nahhas, the Information Center Officer at the Aleppo Chamber of Commerce told Forward that his organization, often the first stop for Turkish businessmen, has been receiving numerous Turkish delegations representing many Turkish cities in both the southeast and further afield over the past 12 months.
In September last year Turkish and Syrian transit visas were abolished leading to the roads around northern Syria now being awash with Turkish-registered trucks. The number of Syrian tourists visiting Turkey doubled in 2009.
Syrian businesses are attracted by Turkey’s large market potential and similar taste in clothing while Syrians themselves are offered high-end tourist resorts and products.
For Turks, doing business with Syria means cheap labor resources and a market hungry for brands, be they chocolate, clothing or machinery.
“From our point of view, you can consider that the cancellation of visa restrictions between Syria and Turkey played an important role in developing business ties between the two countries. Aleppo Chamber of Commerce had issued 432 certificates of origin for products exported to Turkey in the first half of 2009, while in the first six months of 2010 it has issued 892, an increase of 55%,” said Nahhas.
The Aleppo Chamber of Commerce states it does not possess any statistics regarding the volume of tourist activity between Syria and Turkey. However, according to Today’s Zaman, a conservative Turkish daily, and data from the Tourism Investors Association (TYD), the overall number of tourists from Arab countries to Turkey has risen by almost 50% in the first six months of this year over the same period of 2009.
More specifically, the number of Syrian tourists to Turkey jumped a massive 108.8% in the first six months of this year, according to the same data.
An improvement of trade between Syria and Turkey has also proved mutually benefiting. Turkish exports to Syria grew by $300 million in 2009 alone with 51 protocols on business and trade signed off in the same period.
A fact long recognized – that being Syria hosts a vital strategic territorial position – will come into play in an increasing way in the years to come with oil and gas from Iraq set to be exported to fuel-hungry economies in western Europe and the Americas through Syria’s port cities.
Political ties are blooming, as long as this is the case, trade will follow.
