Turkey's exports rise 11.2 percent in November
| File Photo


Turkey's exports increased by 11.2 percent in November, reaching $14.21 billion, while exports went up 21.3 percent to reach $20.54 billion, the Turkish Statistical Institute (TurkStat) said Friday.

The TurkStat also said the foreign trade deficit rose 52.4 percent in November, amounting to $6.3 billion.

The rate of exports meeting imports, meanwhile, fell to 69.2 percent compared to 75.5 percent in November 2016.

Despite currently frosty relations between Ankara and Berlin, Germany was Turkey's top trading partner in November in terms of both imports and exports.

Exports to Germany stood at $1.38 billion, while imports from the country reached $1.98 billion.

Turkey's exports in the first 11 months of 2017 amounted to over $143.2 billion — a 10.4 percent rise compared with the same period in 2016, TurkStat said.

The country's foreign trade volume reached $353.9 billion between January and November this year, marking a 15 percent annual increase, according to provisional data produced by TurkStat and the Ministry of Customs and Trade.

Turkish imports climbed 16.9 percent to $210.7 billion, amounting to a foreign trade deficit of $67.5 billion over the same period.

TurkStat said Germany was Turkey's top export market, at $13.8 billion, or a 9.7 percent share of total exports, while $67.4 billion worth of Turkish exports were delivered to EU28 countries from January to November this year.

In the same period, Turkey imported the most from China ($21.2 billion), Germany ($19.1 billion) and Russia ($17.6 billion).

The manufacturing industry accounted for the biggest share of total exports, at almost 94 percent, followed by agriculture and forestry (3.2 percent), and mining and quarrying (2.2 percent).

The share of high technology products in manufacturing industry exports was 3.8 percent while the exports shares of medium-high and low technology products were 34.4 and 33.3 percent, respectively.

Regarding imports, intermediate goods represented the lion's share with 73.7 percent, reaching $155.2 billion, followed by capital goods (13.9 percent, $29.2 billion) and consumption goods (12.2 percent, $25.7 billion).

The TurkStat data revealed that the manufacturing industry had the largest share in Turkey's imports (81.5 percent, $171.8 billion), of which $70.9 billion were medium-high tech imports, followed by medium-low tech ($55.7 billion) and high tech ($25.7 billion).

Last month, Turkey's exports rose 11.2 percent year-on-year to reach $14.2 billion, while imports climbed to $20.5 billion — a 21.3 percent hike.

"In November 2017 foreign trade deficit was $6.32 billion with a 52.4 percent increase compared with November 2016," TurkStat said.

The percentage of imports covered by exports was 69.2, falling from 75.5 percent in the same month of 2016.