Industrial sector FDI up 251 percent

ISTANBUL - Anatolia News Agency

Foreign direct investments (FDI) in Turkey’s industrial sector in the first quarter were up 251 percent over the same period a year earlier, reaching nearly $2.5 billion, Central Bank data showed yesterday. Overall FDI in the first quarter reached $3.9 billion, the bank said.

FDI in the subsectors of food, beverage and tobacco production hit a record high to increase to $1.2 billion in the first quarter of 2012 from $6 million over the same quarter in 2011, according to the data. On a monthly basis in the first quarter, FDI in the industrial sector was up 102 percent in March over the previous two months.

FDI in the services sector decreased 70.5 percent in the first quarter of 2012 over the same period a year earlier, down at $1.4 billion, and the decline was mainly due to lower investments in the financial and insurance sectors, which saw an 86.5 percent drop to $596 million from $4.4 billion. Britain was the top foreign investor, injecting $1.9 billion, which was followed by $430 million from the Netherlands. The FDI from France was only $30 million, showing a dramatic drop from the $760 million which had made the country the third-biggest foreign investor in Turkey in the same period last year.