Turkey: Projections for GDP and Medium-Term Plan revised downwards
Turkey’s Minister for the Economy, Gaglayan, has announced that the Turkish government will be revising all the calculations underlying the Medium-Term Plan, including the GDP growth forecasts for 2013. The Deputy Prime Minister, Babacan, had spoken recently of GDP growth of over 3%.
The announcement seemed significant because, until then, in its official statements the government had always appeared confident in the possibility of achieving GDP growth of 4%, the target set by the Medium-Term Plan for 2013.
The two politicians seem to be sending out a double message. First, they are grappling with the difficulties their country is currently facing. Babacan pointed out that circumstances have arisen which, at the start of the year, could not have been predicted but which have produced negative effects on Turkey’s growth. They include the events in Gezi Park, an unfavourable international economy, and the crises in Egypt and Syria.
At the same time, keeping to a growth target of over 3% is intended as a message of reassurance both domestically and to the rest of the world, and confirmation of a change of direction with respect to the slowdown in 2012, when GDP grew by 2.2%. Babacan and Gaglayan intend, in short, to play down – but without underestimating – the current difficulties. They also aim to send out a signal of confidence to Turkish citizens (with one eye probably on the local and general elections scheduled for 2014), and to international investors. Babacan commented that he was sure that the rating agencies will not downgrade Turkey. Source: infoMercatiEsteri. Read more, in Italian.
