ANKARA: According to data released by the Turkish Statistical Institute (Turkstat) on Tuesday, Turkey’s exports decreased by 18.8 percent to $11.11 billion and its imports decreased by 14.4 percent to $17.86 billion in May 2015 when compared with the same month of the previous year.
Despite the foreign trade deficit decreasing by 6.1 percent in May from $7.19 billion to $6.75 billion when compared on an annual basis, this number was still the highest figure of foreign trade deficit in 2015.
Seasonally and calendar-adjusted exports decreased by 13.6 percent while imports remain the same compared with the previous month. Calendar-adjusted exports decreased by 16.4 percent and imports decreased by 11.4 percent compared with May 2014.
Exports to the 28 countries of the European Union decreased by 21.3 percent on an annual basis, although their proportion in Turkey’s exported increased from 42.5 percent to 43.8 percent.
Germany was the main destination for Turkey’s exports with $1.16 billion, followed by the U.K. with $689 million, Iraq with $658 million and Italy with $507 million.
China led Turkey’s import list with $1.93 billion, followed by Germany with $1.84 billion, Russia with $1.78 billion and the U.S. with $1.61 billion.
In May 2015, the top country for Turkey’s imports was China ($1.9 billion), records for imports range from Germany ($1.8 billion), Russia ($1.7 billion) and the U.S. ($1.6 billion).
The manufacturing industries covered almost all exports in Turkey with a 92.8 percent share, of which 3.5 were high technology and 31.5 were medium-high technology products.
Four in five import products were manufacturing industries’ products with an 80.4 percent share in May, of which 15.7 was high technology and 44.7 was medium-high technology products.
