The 84th anniversary of the republic is being celebrated today with ceremonies throughout Turkey, as well as at all Turkish overseas facilities. Turkey has been recorded as one of the member states within D-8 organisation that has been performing exceptionally well in economic growth and industrialisation.

The Turkish Republic, in her 84 years of age has came among the world’s 20 biggest economy, with the GNP increase recorded to increase 145-fold since its establishment.

With the demography that has increased from around 12 million in 1923 to around 73 million in 2007 statistic projection, the recent GNP has been immensely growing as well. Eventhough the country still have to work on a set of economic challenges and facing a number of economic crisis during the last decade, Turkey has maintain a remarkable growth rate, that can be seen in its simplest way from the growth of per capita income from just 45 dollar in 1923, to 6,625 dollar in this 2007 financial year projection.

In the year of establishment in 1923, the Turkish Republic recorded export of 51 million dollar and import of 87 million dollar. After a long period of closed-door economic policy, Turkey made a momentous breakthough by introducing an open-door policy by adopting export-growth economic model in January 24th, 1980.

In 2007 Turkey has become the world’s 17th largest economy and exceeded $100 billion in exports despite all obstacles, as said by the Turkish Union of Chambers and Commodity Exchanges (TOBB) President, Rifat Hisarciklioglu during a speech at a Konya Chamber of Commerce meeting on Saturday.

He noted Turkey has the highest tax on base wages in the world as well as high interest rates that curb investment. He said Turkey will definitely be in the top 10 list of largest economies in the world when those conditions equalize with those of competitors. He said making Turkey one of the largest economies is an ideal for them that they have great faith in, adding that he believed this faith is also in the heart of every Turkish entrepreneur.

D-8 Secretary General, Dr. Dipo Alam, on behalf on D-8 Organisation is extending the highest congratulations on this special occasion, and believes that Turkey will flourish as its cooperation within the framework of D-8 Organization developed to higher ground with the supports of all other member states.

Below is some interesting key facts from Turkey:

• Approx. 400,000 university graduates per year.
• Young, well educated and motivated professionals.
• Highly competitive investment conditions.
• Exports increased 240% in 4 years, up to 85 billion USD as of 2006.
• Access to the EU, Central Asia and the Middle East.
• GDP increase of 122% in the past 4 years, reachiung 400 billion USD.
• Ranked as the 17th largest economy in the world and the 6th largest economy in the EU.
• Ranked as the 13th most attratctive country in the world for FDI.
• FDI worth 20.2 billion in 2006
• Annual Average GDP growth of 7.4% per year since 2002

Photo source: Dunya Online Newspaper.

Iran and Pakistan on Friday exchanged views to promote oil and gas interaction between the two brotherly countries.

Deputy Director of the National Iranian Oil Company, Hojattollah Ghanimifard called on the Federal Minister for Petroleum and Natural Resources Amanullah Khan Jadoon here Friday.

Secretary of Petroleum Farrukh Qayyum, Iranian Ambassador Mashaalah Shakeri, Additional Secretary of Petroleum Shaukat Hayat Durrani and Managing Director of Inter State Gas System Limited Hassan Nawab were also present in the meeting.

The two sides expressed satisfaction with the progress in Iran-Pakistan-India Gas Pipeline Project and desired that its early implementation would serve to strengthen and expand the economic and trade relations among the regional countries.

The minister expressed satisfaction with the ongoing negotiations on technical details which have entered into final phase since most of the issues now stand resolved.

The minister said that Pakistan and Iran enjoy excellent brotherly relations in diversified fields which were growing and strengthening with the passage of time.

He said that oil and gas cooperation between the two countries would open up new vistas for their mutual advantage.

He invited the Iranian companies to avail the investment opportunities existed in setting up oil refineries, petrochemical and oil and gas exploration projects for their mutual advantages.

The Iranian special representative Dr. Ghanimifard expressed gratitude to the minister for petroleum for according warm hospitality to his delegation.

He conveyed the minister good wishes from Iranian counterpart and invitation to visit his country.

He said that IPI Gas Pipeline Project would bring the member states closer.

Source: IRNA News Agency.

The first commercial aircraft to be powered by biofuel will fly next year in what could be a significant step towards airlines reducing their oil consumption and carbon dioxide emissions.

Boeing Europe, Russia and Midldle Asia Commercial Planes Sales vice president Marlin Dailey expressed that they were enviromental concious and have been studying on green fuel using and realizing tests for a while. According to the plan, within five to 10 years, Boeing and Airbus jetliners could be flying the friendly green skies with a blend of fuel made from plants rather than petroleum.

The idea of replacing petrol with biofuel in cars is a significant trend in the car industry. Last year Ford announced a £1 billion research project to convert more of its vehicles to these new fuel sources.

The airline and its partners are testing up to eight biofuels to determine which is most effective at altitude. Ethanol, which is becoming an increasingly popular alternative to petrol in cars, has been rejected because it does not burn well in thin-oxygen environments.

This trend offers D-8’s palm oil producer states such as Indonesia and Malaysia a good opportunity once realised. In D-8 Working Group meeting last year, in Jakarta, Indonesia, renewable energy using palm oil for biodiesel was discussed seriously among member states. Malaysia and Indonesia are suppliers of palm oil in the world, that can be applied for biodisel. This year, the Working Group of oil and gas will have a meeting in Cairo, Egypt.

With the coming of Eid-ul Fitr, D-8 Secretariat is extending an Eid Mubarak Greetings to moslem all around the world. For Muslims, Eid ul-Fitr is a joyous occasion with important religious significance, celebrating of the achievement of enhanced piety. It is a day of forgiveness, moral victory, peace of congregation, fellowship, brotherhood and unity.

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Following cooperation plans between its TVA (Tepe Akfen Airports) with Egyptian company in airport expansion projects in Alexandria, Egypt, Turkey is expanding her economic cooperation plans by vending its technology and know-how in the field of transportation to the world, as said by Turkish Transportation Minister Binali Yildirim in September.

Yildirim noted that manufacturing plants are not set up only to produce a country’s own needs, but also for neigbouring countries. He said that Turkey is now able to produce high-speed trains, as well as production facilities for rail and sheet steel for shipbuilding for export purposes. In an exclusive interview with Turkish newspaper of Today’s Zaman last September, Yildirim said they had the same aim in satellite production. “Now we are very concerned about how committed we can become in satellite technology and how much money we can spare from our investment budget,” he noted.

Turkey is mulling satellite technology research and development with a price tag of around $120 million, Yildirim noted, adding that this would at least teach the country how to progress in the field. For him software is the important point in such big projects, not the production itself. “We may get it built somewhere else. What matters is the design and software,” he asserted. Yildirim, who retained his seat in the new Cabinet, made some remarks about his ministry’s plans for the new term. The ministry’s essential purpose is to make citizens’ lives easier and more comfortable, Yildirim underlined. “Your success or failure depends upon your ability to mobilize your opportunities and capabilities in an efficient way within a very limited time. If you keep working in the entrenched, monotonous way of doing business in your ministry, that would be the easier way. This is the way of a comfortable ministry. You receive compliments, your coffee is always ready and you enjoy your life. But time flows like fast-running water, and one day you see that you have left no permanent, pleasant sound,” he warned. “There is another way, the hard one. You disturb yourself; forget the joy of your ministry’s comfortable seat. But this time, you get the pleasant taste of serving your people. This is all about preferences,” he said to Today’s Zaman.

The Indonesian Armed Forces (TNI) have chosen wireless phones made in Turkey for use by their 400,000-strong army, one of the largest armed forces on the Asian continent, reported by Today’s Zaman of Turkey earlier this month.

ASELSAN, an affiliated company of the Turkish Armed Forces Foundation (TSKGV), will provide the Indonesian army with the phones, which provide secure internal communications. A written statement by ASELSAN reports that the deal between it and TNI is particularly important since this is the first defense industry export deal from Turkey to Indonesia. ASELSAN’s wireless phones combine six different frequency bands on a single device. This makes it possible for armies to use only one wireless phone for any kind of communications need.

D-8 Secretary General, Dr. Dipo Alam believes this as an essential lead to explore deeper cooperation between D-8 countries in strategic industries such as those of defence industry. Alam underlined this news as an inspiring development, that goes in accordance with the substance of the meeting held in March this year with Undersecretary of SSM (Turkish Defence Industry), Murad Bayar. “We believe that there are a lot of cooperation scopes that we can explore among our strategic industries. In near future, for example, we hopefully can see this kind of collaboration in airplane or vessel industries,” said Secretary General.

Having significant and promising results for enhancing coooperation between D-8 Organization and international organizations such as UNCTAD and ITC, in Geneva, April 2007; Organization of Islamic Countries and Islamic Development Bank in Jeddah; Chamber of Commerce in several D-8 capitals, Secretary General Dr. Dipo Alam, now is preparing a “Ramadan Safari” to visit Kuala Lumpur, Jakarta, Manila, and Washington, D.C. in October 6-22, 2007.

The working visit is scheduled to be started from Kuala Lumpur, and continued to Jakarta and Manila (8-15 October 2007), and shall be completed in Washington DC (17-22 October 2007). In Kuala Lumpur, Dr. Alam is to be visiting D-8 Malaysia commissioner to discuss necessary preparation to propose ideas regarding the completion of Rules of Origin (RoO), including the preparation for the RoO Workshop in KL, October 28-29, 2007. Afterward, Secretary General is scheduled to be visiting Asian Development Bank, in Manila, to discuss the plan to establish D-8 Working Group on Migrant Workers, Remittances and Microfinance that will jointly be cooperating with IDB, IADB, World Bank and ADB (subject to interest and appropriate programs of the institutions). Also some meetings are to be arranged with relevant authorities to consult on microfinance credits, or other financial plans for SMEs, infrastructure projects and civil aviation to assist these industries in D-8 countries to improve their investment performances, especially if D-8 will soon ratified the Preferential Trade Agreement. Dr. Alam underlines the importance of this meetings since after the working visit to Jeddah, a significant development has been reached with the readiness of Islamic Development Bank (IDB) to support D-8 programs, as stated by their Director of Finance and Loans.

With the same agenda, the safari will then be continued to Washington DC, USA, where Secretary General is scheduled to meet with relevant authorities such as IADB, WorlBank, IFC, and CGAP. The Embassy of Republic of Indonesia in Washington DC will cordially be assisting Secretary General with the arrangement of these meetings.

Meanwhile, Dr. Alam also extended his gratitude to Indonesian Consulate General in Jeddah, as well as Indonesian Permanent Mission in Geneva, and wish both institution would continue to support D-8 mission for a win-win cooperation with other international organisation such as OIC, IDB, UNCTAD, and ITC.

In Jakarta, Secretary General is also planning to meet with the Indonesian DGCA and CEO of Air Asia, to encourage D-8 private aviation companies to participate more actively in D-8 aviation programs and frameworks, as well as to open discussion on potential cooperation on Low-Cost-Carrier (non-group regular airlines) for benefiting D-8 migrant workers, umrah, hajj, tourists passengers, as well as air cargo - once the Easing Visa Agreement, Custom Administrative Cooperation, and Preferential Trade Agreements is fully ratified by all D-8 member states this year). Secretary General would also like to invite this private companies to the 3rd DGCA workshop program which is scheduled to be held in Istanbul, in December 2007.

Business reform in Egypt, Indonesia, and Turkey means more businesses have been created, according to “Doing Business 2008,” the fifth in an annual report series issued by the World Bank and International Finance Corporation (IFC) on Sept. 26, 2007.

According to the report, countries within Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union saw the most reforms in 2006-07, along with a large group of emerging markets, including China and India. Large emerging markets are implementing reforms quickly; Turkey, China, Egypt, India, Indonesia and Vietnam all have improved the ease of doing business.

The report revealed that Turkey was a more reformist country than many developed and industrialized countries. Reforms, particularly in the last two or three years, have simplified doing business in Turkey and improved investment conditions. “As a result, capital flow to Turkey has accelerated,” said the report.

Turkey cut its corporate income tax from 30 percent to 20 percent and introduced electronic customs procedures by implementing a customs modernization project, reducing the processing time for exports by six days and imports by 10 days.

The time necessary for establishing a business in Turkey declined to six days, the same as the US, with six bureaucratic processes, thanks to the latest reforms; processing time is 47 days in Spain, 20 days in Switzerland and 13 days in England.

The report also emphasized that if Turkey keeps the reform process on track, it will become one of the world’s most attractive countries in terms of business and investment.

In the report Egypt tops the list of reformers that are making it easier to do business. Egypt greatly improved its position in the global rankings on the ease of doing business, with reforms in five of the 10 areas studied by the report. And for the second year running, Singapore tops the aggregate rankings on the ease of doing business. Turkey is in 57th place and Egypt is 126th.

Besides Egypt, the other top 10 business reform countries are, in order, Croatia, Ghana, FYR Macedonia, Georgia, Colombia, Saudi Arabia, Kenya, China and Bulgaria. The countries made it simpler to start a business and also strengthened property rights, enhanced investor protections, increased access to credit, eased tax burdens and expedited trade while reducing costs. In all 200 reforms in 98 economies were introduced between April 2006 and June 2007.

“The report finds that equity returns are highest in countries that are reforming the most,” said Michael Klein, World Bank/IFC vice president for financial and private sector development. “Investors are looking for upside potential, and they find it in economies that are reforming — regardless of their starting point,” he added.

Eastern Europe and central Asia, as a region, surpassed East Asia this year in the ease of doing business ratings. Several of the region’s countries have even passed many economies of Western Europe on this score.

Doing Business 2008 ranks 178 economies on the ease of doing business. The rankings are based on 10 indicators of business regulation that track the time and cost to meet government requirements in business start-up, operation, trade, taxation and closure. The rankings do not reflect such areas as macroeconomic policy, quality of infrastructure, currency volatility, investor perceptions or crime rates.

The International Organization of Employers (IOE) welcomed the launch of the 2008 report. “Employers congratulate the World Bank and the Doing Business team for creating a reform movement that has already begun to increase development and improve people’s lives,” said IOE President Abraham Katz. “The reports identify the areas where reform is needed, and most importantly, provide the incentives for governments to act.”

D-8 Secretary General, Dr. Dipo Alam is pleased with this WB’s report, and believes that D-8 economic cooperation has greater prospect to develop, if the reforms will be well continued. In fact, after series of working visit to OIC and IDB in Jeddah, D-8 Organisation was invited by Inter-American Development Bank and IFAD, and the Secretary General will continue his visit to Washinton D.C. on October 18-19, 2007 to attend the Migrant Workers and Remittances Conference. There he will also visit officials of the World Bank to address and discuss potential cooperation.

While certain media, columnist, and politicians in Turkey goes so far as pointing at Malaysia and fearing that Turkey would similarly turned into a “moderate moslem” country as Malaysia, since most of their moslem female population are wearing headscarfs - which is perceived as symbol of “backward Islamist” society, on the contrary, Nobel Laureates Joseph Stiglitz, a prominent economist of the US, praised the advancement of Malaysian economy as a miracle.

Stiglitz wrote that at independence, Malaysia was one of the poorest countries in the world. Its GDP (in purchasing power parity terms) was comparable to that of Haiti, and Honduras, and some 5 percent below that of Ghana. Today, Malaysia’s income is 7.8 times that of Ghana, and more than five times that of Honduras. In the global growth league tables, Malaysia is in the top tier, along with China, Taiwan, South Korea and Thailand.

Hard-core poverty is set to be eliminated by 2010, with the overall poverty rate falling to 2.8 percent. Malaysia has succeeded in markedly reducing the income divides that separated various ethnic groups, not by bringing the top down, but by bringing the bottom up.

Part of the country’s success in reducing poverty reflects strong job creation. While unemployment is a problem in most of the world, Malaysia has been importing labor. In the 50 years since independence, 7.24 million jobs have been created, an increase of 261 percent, which would be equivalent to the creation of 105 million jobs in the United States.

Malaysia attained success by taking an alternative course, looking instead to the highly successful countries of East Asia. It invested in education and technology, pushed a high savings rate, enacted a strong and effective affirmative action program, and adopted sound macroeconomic policies.

Malaysia also recognized that success required an active role for government. It eschewed ideology, following or rejecting outsiders’ advice on a pragmatic basis. Most tellingly, during the financial crisis of 1997, it did not adopt International Monetary Fund (IMF) policies — and as a result had the shortest and shallowest downturn of any of the afflicted countries. When it re-emerged, it was not burdened with debt and bankrupt firms like so many of its neighbors.

This success was, of course, not only a matter of economics: had Malaysia followed the policies recommended by the IMF, it would have torn apart the social fabric created over the preceding four decades.

“Malaysia’s success thus should be studied both by those looking for economic prosperity and those seeking to understand how our world can live together, not just with toleration, but also with respect, sharing their common humanity and working together to achieve common goals,” concluded Stiglitz.

D-8 Secretary General personally also regrets the misapplied comparation of Malaysia and Turkey that triggered a heated debate in the Turkish media recently. He believes that with current Malaysian good economic performance, soon Malaysia transformed to be a developed country. This advancement and the sucess of Malaysian economy is the benchmark for other D-8 member states.

D-8 Secretariat raised a concern with a recent political terms that controversially applied by certain media and politician in Turkey: “Malaysianized Turkey”. It is believed to be triggered by a remark by the former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, as well as member of the board of directors of the Council on Foreign Relations in New York, Richard Holbrooke, following the Turkey’s July 22 elections. Holbrooke cited Turkey and Malaysia as two examples of “moderate Islam” that the US and Europe wanted to see nourished in the Islamic world. The remarks was then brought by mainstream Turkish media into a heated debate over whether the AK Party’s resounding victory and the new constitution efforts would put Turkey on an Islamic path akin to that of Malaysia.

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has responded to claims that ongoing efforts to rewrite the Turkish Constitution would undermine secularism and turn Turkey into an Islamic country like Malaysia, saying such arguments are aimed at weakening his Justice and Development Party after his landslide election victory. The Turkish prime minister commented about this debates in New York, after attending meetings at the UN General Assembly, and afterward met with his Malaysian counterpart, Abdullah Ahmad Badawi and member of the board of directors of the Council on Foreign Relations in New York, Richard Holbrooke.

The meeting between these important figures is cherished by the D-8 Secretary General, Dr. Dipo Alam. He said that both Malaysia and Turkey are countries with the most progressive economic development, shown through their sharp growth, trade, industry, investment, and tourism. Sharing other common facts as countries with moslem majority, does not mean that these countries are drowned into radicalism or backwardness. On the contrary, both countries has proven to continue developing democratically, as well as propelled significantly in their economies.

With exports of 140.9 billion US dollars and imports of 114.6 billion US dollars (2005), Malaysia is definitely among the best player around. In D-8 Organisation, Malaysia is the leader in export-import figures, and followed by Turkey in the second place. Therefore a stigma about Malaysia as a country with a strict Islamic law is not relevant with radicalism and backwardness debate. Malaysia in fact is a good example of country that has brought all elements in society in full diversity and harmony, and has reached a significant economic growth. Meanwhile, the development in tourism both to Malaysia and Turkey is a solid proof that the level of international community recognition has been raised higher than ever, amid the fact that they are moslem-majority populated countries.

“We at the Secretariat regret this unnecessary debate brought by inappropriate terms by media and politician, since it only created a counterproductive stigma to both countries that so far are doing exceptionally well in economy,” said Dr. Alam at his office yesterday.