Funding Programme for Turkish Shipbuilding
The Turkish Government has recognised the opportunities of the shipbuilding industry, and launched a funding programme for Turkish companies in the maritime industries. “The shipbuilding industry ensures networking of Turkey with the world,” said Turkish Finance Minister Mehmet Şimşek at the launch of a ship at the Selah Yard earlier this year. Turkey and the whole of the region therefore give enormous market potential. That also opens up good opportunities for marine equipment suppliers from abroad. The Turkish shipbuilding industry had to face losses from the financial crisis like other shipbuilding countries, but the companies were able to draw on relatively well filled order books. On 1 April this year, as shown in the figures of Clarkson Research Services, the Turkish shipyards had orders for 137 ships with a total of 1.2 million CGT, including 79 tankers with a capacity of 10,000 tonnes dwt, and 28 Handy Chemical Tankers, i.e. chemical carriers in the 10 – 60,000 dwt range.