The head of one of the top Türkiye's business associations evaluated on Sunday recent contacts with officials in neighboring Syria, conveying they had a "very productive" visit that covered several meetings and talks on trade, investments and what can mutually be done in this regard.
"There is no concretness, 'in terms we signed that agreement,' but clear issues were discussed, and in this respect I find the visit quite concrete," said Nail Olpak, head of the Foreign Economic Relations Board (DEIK).
Olpak, along with Trade Minister Ömer Bolat, was part of a large business delegation that visited Damascus earlier this week. Following two-day contacts in Syria and the first high-profile visit by a Turkish economic official since the fall of Bashar Assad, Olpak evaluated the visit and the talks they held with the press.
Pointing to the importance of this visit after the formation of the new Syrian government, Olpak mentioned that they initially met with Syrian Economy Minister Nidal al-Shaar.
The new transitional government in Syria was announced late in March by Syria interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa, marking a further step in push to rebuild war-torn country after years of crippling sanctions and lack of investment.
"When we list the expectations of the business world, there is the side of bilateral trade, which is relatively the easier part. Since he is also the minister of industry, we also discussed the investment side. It is important to be realistic, and investments should be considered in the short, medium and long term," Olpak explained.
"Investment is not something that will quickly yield returns from today to tomorrow. Yes, there is potential in Syria, but we need to realize that time is needed," he added.
"In this regard, we discussed what we could do mutually. Of course, for trade and investment to be possible, their transportation, that is, logistics, needs to be secured. In this context, we met with Syrian Minister of Transport Yarub Suleyman Badr. There is land, sea and air transportation involved in this. We discussed what could be done with the minister in this regard," Olpak furthered.
Moreover, the DEIK head noted that the Syrian minister mentioned that they do not want to operate some of their ports and similar enterprises and are ready for cooperation with those interested.
"I think this is one of the areas that can be entered quickly, because 'you're not discussing a brand-new investment; you're discussing an existing, idle, non-operational business,'" he said.
Olpak also pointed out that there are areas in Türkiye, such as certain aspects of the textile industry, where there are unused capacities, and they discussed whether it would be possible to bring them to Syria.
Emphasizing the need for the banking sector to be present and function in Syria for trade to occur, Olpak said: "To be able to trade, you need to be able to transfer money and establish the rules of trade law. We had a clear conversation on this matter with Syrian Finance Minister Mohamed Yasser Barnia."
"Following this, we have expectations for two separate laws: one, the 'Investment Promotion and Protection Agreement,' and the other, the 'Double Taxation Avoidance Agreement.' We said, 'Once these are in place, the business world will know what to do,'" said Olpak.
Moreover, he mentioned they had "a very important meeting" with land and sea ports chief Kuteybe Ahmed Badawi.
"We had the opportunity to discuss what is happening at the customs gates. In this regard, it was a very productive visit. There was no concrete statement like 'We signed this agreement,' but clear topics were discussed, and in this regard, I find the visit very concrete. We did not return saying, 'We signed an agreement,' but we returned with a very good infrastructure. We will follow up on the process," he stated.
Olpak also mentioned another issue concerning DEIK, namely their work with business councils.
"Our Türkiye-Syria Business Council needs to designate its Syrian counterpart, and we conveyed this, and they agreed with us. They said they would designate our counterpart as soon as possible. This was one of the very concrete steps for DEIK," he added.
Olpak also explained that some areas have the potential for rapid progress, saying: "We can move trade quite quickly, but we need to know that investments will take some time. Some investments, especially those that are idle and non-operational here, can be quickly activated, and we could bring similar ones from Türkiye here, but for an investment that will be built from scratch, certain things need to be in place first."
