Regional risks hit boat and yacht exports: Association

ANKARA - Anadolu Agency

DHA Photo

The head of the Boat and Yacht Exporters Association (GYİB) has said the regional uncertainties in Turkey’s neighbors have negatively affected the country’s boat and yacht exports, adding that a further decline is expected in figures this year. 

GYİB President Başaran Bayrak noted that Turkey’s exports in this field decreased 19 percent in 2015 compared to the previous year. 

“While our boat and yacht exports were worth $2.65 billion in 2008, we saw the exports have regressed to around $1.1 billion in 2013. We exported around $1.3 billion worth exports in 2014, but this figure declined to around $1 billion in 2015,” he said. 

Noting that the sector’s target to surge exports to $10 billion by 2023, the 100th anniversary of the establishment of the Turkish Republic, he added: “Due to the global economic crisis, the contraction in the world trade, the rise in the boat and yacht supply in the Far Eastern countries, the regional uncertainties in Turkey’s neighbors and the oil plunge have negatively affected our sector.”

He said that the boat and yacht producing countries have supported their own manufacturers. 

“It is nearly impossible for our sector, which is of strategically significant and labor intensive, to become competitive unless the sector is supported just as its rivals in other countries are. We, therefore, need special support,” he added. 

Bayrak said the sector has now employed over 40,000 people along with the sub-contractors. 

“In hot seasons, this figure rises to 150,000 people,” he noted, adding that the sector has no problem with finding qualified labor force, but faces problems in workforce for intermediate jobs. 

Bayrak said the largest amount of exports are made to European Union countries and Norway, adding that the demand has also been increasing from the Marshall Islands, Malta, Saudi Arabia, Gulf countries and Russia. 

The sector has also defined several new markets, including Iceland, Canada, Iran and African countries, he added.