SME Networking Project Launch Event - 28 July 2011, Ankara/Turkey

Implemented by an international consortium led by Ecorys, the launch event of SME Networking Project has been successfully organised on July 28th, in Ankara Turkey. Hosted by the Ministry of Economy, the launch event brought together a high level of attendants including the Minister of Economy, Mr. Zafer Çağlayan; the Minister of EU Affairs and Chief Negotiator, Mr. Egemen Bağış; Deputy Head of the EU Delegation, Tibor Varadi, including the Managing Director of Ecorys International Dr. Julia Djarova.

The speech of Dr. Djarova gave a driving start to the event in which she emphasized the importance of the project with regards to Turkey’s current economic growth and its expected contribution to Turkey’s 2023 Strategy Plans.

The project aims to improve networking and cooperation between the developed and the under-developed regions of Turkey through developing and piloting cluster-based inter and intra-regional networking and cooperation strategies. In accordance with the project’s overall aim, Dr. Djarova stated that the strongest sectors of the regions are going to be determined and at least 12 clusters will be formed with the aim of improving Turkish enterprises and their exports.

Following Dr. Djarova’s speech, Egemen Bağış mentioned the importance of cooperation and the solution to the EU’s economic situation depending on clustering. He also indicated that Turkey’s membership to the EU will stimulate clustering and will be beneficial to the Union during times of economic hardship.

Continuing along the same theme, Tibor Varadi mentioned that during Turkey’s accession period to the EU, regional competitiveness has highly increased. Accordingly, Turkey being more pioneering and competitive, she should gravitate towards more innovative industries. He concluded his speech by stating that cooperation can be provided through increasing competitiveness.

As the host of the event, Zafer Çağlayan emphasized that as Turkey being one of the biggest suppliers of goods to the EU, private sector has a gratitude in shaping the Turkish political approaches. In addition, he reminded the audience that Turkey has been lacking with regards to the conception and implementation of long term projects. In this sense, he highlighted that the SME Networking project is crucial in reaching Turkey’s long-term goals, especially her export targets for the year 2023. 

Trabzon, Çorum, Samsun, Gaziantep and Kahramanmaraş have been selected as pilot provinces. During the implementation period of the project many tools will be introduced such as National Benchmarking System. By the end of the project, it is expected that 400 enterprises will benefit from the project outputs and 25% of an increase in their export capacity is targeted.

The project budget is 3.5million Euros covering 5 growth centres and will be implemented for the next 30 months starting from February 2011 until the end of August 2013. During this period Ecorys will provide technical assistance to the Ministry of Economy.

For further information please contact Aslı Hekimoğlu from the Project Office: