Recovery of bilateral trade with Turkey despite issues

Despite the problems with Turkey, according to the data of the Greek embassy in Ankara, for the 9 months of 2021, it seems that bilateral trade flows have begun to recover, maintaining a trade deficit for Greece. Greek exports increased by 40.5% to € 1.36 billion (Turkey 5th country – export destination), while Greek imports recorded an even stronger increase of 47.5%, to € 1.7 billion (Turkey 8th supplier country for Greece). In both cases, the performance of the 9 months 2021 exceeds those of the entire year 2020.

According to the processing of data by the ISD office of the Greek Embassy in Ankara, for the first 9 months of 2021, wheat reappeared in the products we export and in fact with high value exports (€ 44 million, KSO 1001). It is noted that in 2020 Greek exports to Turkey did not include wheat products at all, while in previous years, Greek exports had not exceeded € 20 million (year 2016).

Greek cotton exports increased (76%, € 169 million, CSO 5201), which is still our 2nd most important export product in Turkey, after petroleum products. Significant increases were also observed in exports of medicines (166%), scrap iron (1,586%), yachts (156%), copper bars (2,140%) and milled iron products (252%). On the contrary, the reduction of rice exports is remarkable (-79%), our 6th most important export product in 2020. There is also a decrease in the exports of propylene polymers (-15%), insecticides / herbicides (-29%), gold (- 52%) and fertilizers (-50%).

As for the products imported from Turkey, significant increases are observed in the petroleum products (439%, € 262 million, CSO 2710) which dropped in the 2nd place the imports of vehicles (20%, € 80 million), in the raw aluminum (1.226% ) and ethylene polymers (376%). It is worth noting that fish imports remained almost at the same level as last year (€ 43 million, CSO 0302), however, there was an increase in imports of fish fillets from Turkey (60%, € 19 million, CSO 0304), remaining, however, at a lower level than fresh fish.

Foreign Trade of Turkey (9 months 2021)

Regarding Turkey’s foreign trade in the current year (9 months 2021, source TUIK), the following are noted:

– T-exports increased by 35.9% ($ 161 billion)

– T / imports increased by 23.7% ($ 193 billion)

– The trade deficit decreased by 14.6% to $ 32.3 billion.

– The volume of trade, excluding oil and gold, amounted to $ 38.5 billion.

– The trade balance, excluding oil and gold, amounted to a surplus of $ 1.4 billion.

– The most important country of origin of Turkish imports was China ($ 23.5 billion) followed by Russia ($ 20 billion), Germany ($ 16.3 billion), the United States ($ 9.5 billion) and Italy ($ 8.3 billion).

– The most important destination country for exports was Germany ($ 14 billion) and the top five are completed by the USA ($ 10.5 billion), the United Kingdom ($ 9.7 billion), Italy ($ 8 billion), and Iraq ($ 7.6 billion).

– Greece was 29th among the countries-suppliers of Turkey and 18th among the countries-destination of Turkish exports.

– According to Eurostat, in the first 9 months of 2021, Turkey’s exports to the EU amounted to € 56.2 billion, increased by 25%, while Turkey’s imports from the EU MS amounted to a total of € 57 , 5 billion, increased by 16.4%.