Following the 2022 DEİK Business Councils’ Ordinary Financial General Assembly, DEİK Business Diplomacy Awards found their owners

The Foreign Economic Relations Board (DEİK) held the 2022 Ordinary Financial General Assembly of the Business Councils in Istanbul on January 14, 2023. Following the General Assembly where the activities of 152 Business Councils were discussed, the DEİK Business Diplomacy Award Ceremony, which was held for the fourth time this year, brought together the business diplomacy artists of the Turkish business world.

Hosted by Nail Olpak, President of DEİK, with the participation of Mehmet Muş, Minister of Trade of the Republic of Türkiye, DEİK Business Council Chairpersons, and businesspeople, the DEİK Business Diplomacy Award Ceremny became a stage to award 12 DEİK Business Councils for outstanding performance in 6 categories with their business diplomacy activities in 2022.

Minister Muş: “DEİK is a significant lever in terms of expanding our business world to global markets”

Extending his thanks to DEİK Family and Business Councils for their contribution to Türkiye’s exports and foreign trade, Trade Minister Mehmet Muş said, “We are maintaining our efforts to increase our exports, strengthen the competitiveness of our industry and attract foreign capital to our country, and we are working together with our private sector. In this context, solution-oriented mechanisms, led by the private sector, such as DEİK, as the complementary power of the field of interstate diplomacy, play a critical role. We consider our Business Councils and businesspeople under the umbrella of DEİK very valuable in terms of preparing our business world for the transformation in the global economy, and the work they do with the business circles and private sector organizations of many countries for green economy, renewable energy, start-up activities, and e-commerce.”

Olpak: “The exports for the year 2022 were USD 254 billion”

Drawing attention to the support given by the Foreign Economic Relations Board (DEİK) to the export family with the 152 Business Councils, DEİK President Nail Olpak said, “Our export journey started with an export of USD 50 million in 1923. In 1984, we achieved USD 7 billion for the first time. As a result of the policy of overseas expansion, our economy began to strengthen and relations started to develop on a win-win basis.

This process brought along new needs and structures. Carrying out Türkiye’s Business Diplomacy with 152 Business Councils spread all over the world, DEİK was one of such needs and structures. Comparison of the events we organized in 2022 with the countries we trade with the most shows that there is a significan overlap between them. The 11 countries where we organize the most business diplomacy events are also the countries with which we achieved the highest volume of foreign trade. Another significant result is the comparison of our total exports to the countries in which we have a Business Council. We exported USD 250 billion of our USD 254 billion exports to countries where we have a Business Council. This demonstrates the importance of the support given to the export family by our Business Councils as DEİK.