TURKISH AEROSPACE SECTOR 2019 DEVELOPMENTS

Hüseyin Keskin, General Manager of State Airports Authority, shared the statistics of the aircraft, passengers and freight for the first eight months of 2019 from his Twitter account. Keskin, mentioning that Turkey has gained worldwide success in aviation sector with its innovations and said “The last 10 years of our country, where nearly three-fold increase in passenger traffic, aviation ‘leading sectors’ as continues to be the pride of Turkey. Airline aircraft, passenger and freight statistics for August 2019 and the first eight months of the year point to a very good picture that can be expressed as ‘August blessings in the air’. In August, 23 million 262 thousand 843 passengers were served at our airports. In the eight-month period, total passenger traffic with direct transit passengers amounted to 140 million 121 thousand 303.
According to the information compiled from Turkey Exporters Assembly (TIM), this year, foreign sales in the third quarter was the highest increase in the defense and aerospace sector compared to the same period last year.
Turkey’s exports increased by 2.6 percent during this period. The defense and aerospace sector ranked first in this area with a 37.7 percent increase in exports. In the January-September period of last year, exports of the sector with 1 billion 346 million 869 thousand dollars reached to 1 billion 855 million 274 thousand dollars.
The increase in exports in the said period in defense and aviation sector was followed by cement, glass, ceramic and soil products with 18.9 percent, with 17.6 percent chemicals products and with 11.3 percent followed by hazelnuts and its products. In the 9 months of the year, defense and aviation exports increased by 17.1 percent to the United States with 595 million 248 thousand dollars and maintained the first place in the industry’s foreign sales. The USA was followed by Germany with 184 million 776 thousand dollars. Exports to Germany increased by 9.7 percent compared to the same period last year. Defense and aerospace exports to Oman during this period increased by 35.8 percent and amounted to 184 million 776 thousand dollars.
Foreign sales to Qatar were realized an increase of 336.6 percent to 138 million 753 thousand dollars and to the United Arab Emirates with an increase of 763.8 percent to 96 million 454 thousand dollars.
In the first 9 months of the defense and aerospace sector, Ankara was the province with the highest number of exports. In the period in question, 44.4 percent of the sector’s exports, Ankara’s capital, was on its own.
Ankara’s defense and aviation exports amounted to 825 million 313 thousand dollars in the first three quarters of 2019, an increase of 26.6 percent compared to the same period last year.