Welcome to İEF İzmir Business Days
Distinguished Participants,
This year, we will be organizing the 91st Izmir International Fair, which is the first commercial fair in Türkiye.
The Fair has become an important tradition in Türkiye, and I hope the Fair and the other activities that will be held on this occasion will be productive and beneficial for our country and nation.
On September 1st and 2nd , Türkiye will also host the İzmir Business Days and I am very pleased to inaugurate this important event together with the Honorable Dignitaries from various countries. As known, İzmir Business Days has been contributing to the exchange of views for the participants from different countries to create a more prosperous world.
Since 2020, firstly pandemic, and then Russian-Ukraine crisis have been testing the world economy. It has been confronted with a number of deepening difficulties such as logistics, supply chains, raw materials, energy and global inflation. All countries have been going through a difficult period.
That’s why, we have titled this year’s theme as “Agriculture Trade: Building Resilient Global Supply Chains”.
As the Ministry of Trade, in collaboration with İZFAŞ, and with the contributions of the İzmir Chamber of Commerce, Aegean Region Chamber of Industry, İzmir Trade Exchange, and İzmir Chamber of Maritime, we have prepared a comprehensive program.
During the program, at various sessions, the participants will focus on supply chains in food and agriculture trade that have been impacted for a variety of reasons. Establishing new supply channels, finding new routes have become more important than ever.
As the supply chains are reorganized in many products from agriculture to industry, our country has been undertaking significant initiatives to increase our exports. In the context of the “Far Countries Strategy” which we have prepared this year, we aim to diversify our traditional export markets, and carry over our export range further to the distant countries. In a similar vein, we also put together a new, modern and exhaustive package of support to the use of our business community for our services sectors which have been increasing its share in the world economy.
In line with our balanced policy as appreciated by the world, the Grain Corridor Agreement initiated and concluded through the mediation of our country is a significant indicator of the efforts towards mitigating.
Similarly, aiming to mitigate the risks triggered by the global food supply chain crisis, and to ensure the continuation of the world trade without any disruption, our country also acted as an intermediary for the conclusion of the grain corridor agreement in parallel with its balanced policy, as appreciated all over the world. This is an important indicator of our efforts to secure the trade flows and supplies.
On the occasion of İzmir Business Days, we will be pleased to listen to the other ideas, which will help improve the situation in light of the current conditions and available capabilities,.
Thanks to the online sessions that reaches to a large number of viewers, reveal the changing elements in the world, and it will be instrumental in addressing risks, opportunities and possible solutions.
We are very pleased to see that the number of participants have been increasing every year in this program. Last year, there were more than 2000 viewers from 25 countries. We aim to raise the number of participants each year.
We are delighted to host the speakers and the participants this year as well. In addition, we are also grateful to the Honorable Ministers, who agreed to honor us by participating in the opening session, for their contributions.
I hope that we will meet and get together in İzmir next year and I wish you success once again.
Thank you.
