IKMIB President Adil Pelister Makes a Statement

Statement from İKMİB Chairman Adil Pelister Istanbul Chemical Substances and Products Exporters Association (İKMİB) Board Chairman Adil Pelister issued a written statement regarding the reduction of VAT on essential food products announced by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and the "Turkey Economy Model New Steps and Inflation Measures" announced by Treasury and Finance Minister Nureddin Nebati.   Pelister made the following remarks in his assessment: "We view the TRY 60 billion package under the Credit Guarantee Fund (KGF), whose details were explained by our Treasury and Finance Minister, as an important step for the business world and the future of our chemistry sector. With 3 separate support packages featuring varying terms and a grace period option of 6 months to 2 years along with favorable interest rates, support will be provided for our SMEs and exporters to access financing that will strengthen their capital. In particular, our chemistry sector, which is among the priority target sectors in development plans, can benefit from the investment support package. It has been announced that investment credits will have a maximum grace period of 2 years with a total term of 8 years. It was stated that SMEs can access investment credits up to TRY 25 million and large companies up to TRY 100 million at 16 percent interest. We attach importance to high value-added domestic and national production in our chemistry sector. From this perspective, we also expect the package amount prepared as TRY 60 billion to be increased somewhat and the support provided to our SME exporters to be strengthened further. New investments are needed to reduce import dependency in our sector. In this regard, it is gratifying for our sector to have investment and export support packages alongside the Technology-Driven Industry Initiative program. At the same time, the reduction of VAT to 1 percent on essential food products announced by our President will also have a positive effect on inflation trends. We believe that within the scope of fighting inflation, expenses such as VAT and Special Consumption Tax should be reduced or decreased in our chemistry sector, which supplies raw materials and semi-finished products to other sectors."