"THE GOVERNMENT MUST DEFINITELY CONTINUE TO TAKE MEASURES AGAINST THE CRISIS"
The Istanbul Chamber of Industry held its May meeting around
the agenda item, "Identifying the Views and Recommendations
of Assembly Members on the Current State of the Economy and
Their Expectations from the Government Prior to the Board
of Directors' Visit to Ankara". Speaking at the meeting,
Board Chairman C. Tanıl Küçük drew attention
to the fact that industrial production contracted in March
by 20.9% following contractions of 21.3% in January and 23.8%
in February. Küçük observed that while a contraction of 20.9%
would be considered high under normal conditions, in this
case it was regarded as the lesser of two evils since it was
smaller than the previous month's. Expressing his belief that
the downturn in production has bottomed out and the crisis
slowing down, Küçük added: "The fact that production
in March was up by 13.4% on February strengthens our hopes
in this direction. In another small but hopeful development,
capacity utilization is up as well. At 66.8% in April, capacity
utilization in manufacturing was higher than in the first
three months, rising by 2.1 points on the previous month.
This upward movement in the rate of capacity utilization in
the manufacturing industry can be seen as an indication that
the measures the government has taken against the crisis are
starting to produce results. It is essential that similar
measures embracing all the sectors be continued."
Click
here for the full text and the Chairman's previous remarks
at the Assembly
|
