Page 12 - ITM NEWS

“ITM is Great Opportunity for

Introducing Our Country to the World with

the Number of Exhibitors and Visitors”

Ahmet Fikret Kileci, Chairman of the Board of the Southeastern Anatolia Textile and Raw Materials Exporters

Associations, stated: ‘‘ITM Exhibition is a great opportunity in terms of introducing our country and region to the
world, considering the number of exhibitors and visitors.’’

he Southeastern Anatolia Region has a in the printing and dyeing-finishing departments at
deep-rooted history, especially considering the production plants. In the coming period, I think
weaving. In the Ottoman period, fabrics that we will increase our production capacity with
Twoven in this region began to be exported, these new investments and thus, we can reach
and the contribution to the textile sector of the more potential customers in our target markets.
region continued to increase in the following years.
The region is located in the summit domestically ■ What are your roadmap and projects as
with respect to the carpet exports, while it is second Southeastern Anatolia Exporters Associations to
in Turkey in Textile and Raw Materials exports. increase the contribution of Southeastern Anatolia
The Southeastern Anatolian Exporters Association to our foreign trade volume and national economy,
(GAİB), where four different “Exporters Union” especially in the field of textile?
operating in different sectors are gathered under First of all, we try to explain in every platform how
one roof, contributes to the solution of the problems important the textile industry is for our region
experienced by our exporters, removing obstacles and our country and to express that this industry
to exports and striving to increase the volume of should be reinforced with increasing value-added
country’s exports. production and development. However, if we come
Ahmet Fikret Kileci, Chairman of the Board of to an understanding of the value and accumulation
Southeastern Anatolia Textile and Raw Materials we have in the scope of textiles, we see what we
Exporters Associations, and presently functioning can add to our foreign trade volume and economy.
as GAİB Coordinator President, answered our Ahmet Fikret Kileci - GAIB Coordinator President Through this awareness, we can draw a path to
questions for ITM News. increase our contributions.
percent. Our region, with the strength it gained As Exporters Unions, we prioritize training
■ What are the contributions of Southeastern from its experience with all its provinces, especially opportunities and we advance our projects in this
provinces, where textiles manufacturing have a Gaziantep, which is the heart of the textile industry manner. You know, trade and export operations are
significant volume, to our economy, exports, and and its exports, continues to move the export now carried on digital platforms. We are trying to
foreign trade volume? forward. create an awareness in our region with the ‘Digital
In 2018, there is an export record of 1 million 800 Transformation, E-Commerce and E-Export’ training
million dollars for textiles registered on the name “NEW FACILITIES ESTABLISHED FOR COTTON sessions that we initiated and try to draw attention
of GAİB. In the January-October 2019 period, 1.5 AND POLYESTER YARNS IN THE SOUTHEASTERN to this change. In addition to these awareness
billion dollars of textile exports were made by ANATOLIA REGION” training sessions in the provinces of the region,
the members of the Textile and Raw Materials ■ Can you please provide us information our “E-Commerce Expertise” training in Gaziantep
Exporters Association. We are the second regarding the investments made in the textile has given graduates twice. The third session is
association with the most exports in textiles and industry in 2019 in the Southeastern Anatolian ongoing right now. Through this kind of education
raw materials in general with this figure. When provinces? projects, we believe that companies that produce
we look at the individual province’s overall textile Last year, new facilities for cotton yarn, polyester, and export in various fields, including the textile
exports in Turkey, Gaziantep, the leader of our and blended yarns were established in our industry, will help the digital transformation and
region, is ranked second domestically. Import and region. These modern facilities will strengthen this transformation will return to us as added-value
export data reveal to us that the ratio of exports to our infrastructure, which provides quality yarn and high profitability. On the other hand, within the
imports for Gaziantep is consistently increasing. and fabric supplies. On the other hand, there are scope of ‘Inosuit - Innovation Focused Mentoring
According to the latest data, this rate was 152.5 apparel investments in our region. We see revisions Project’ that we conduct in cooperation with Turkey

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