ANKARA: Istanbul is boosting state income by bringing in nearly half of all tax revenues collected by the Treasury, according to figures released by the Ministry of Finance.
Istanbul single-handedly contributed a sweeping 46.07 percent of the entire state budget with some 185 billion lira ($71 billion at the current exchange rate) in 2014.
The province of Istanbul is also boosting the country’s exports by providing nearly half of Turkey’s foreign trade in 2014, according to the Turkish Exporters’ Assembly.
The country´s capital city Ankara provided some 44 billion lira ($17 billion), a contribution of 11 percent of the state budget, for the Treasury.
The western port city of Izmir provided about 42.3 billion lira ($16.1 billion) – 10.5 percent of the budget.
Istanbul`s neighbor Kocaeli province, home to the country´s sole oil refinery, came in fourth, providing some 40 billion lira ($15.2 billion) for the treasury.
A total of some 448.4 billion lira ($171 billion) was spent from the Central Administration Budget in the last year.
The Turkish government spent approximately 110 billion lira on its employees in the fiscal year 2014 alone ? a price tag that makes employee payments that year the government’s largest expenditure. Nearly 50 billion lira have been spent on interest rate expenses in 2014.
