IKV Chairman Ayhan Zeytinoğlu attended the January Assembly meeting of Istanbul Chamber of Industry (ICI) on the issues of education, quality and R&D on 22 January 2020. The Union of Chambers and Commodity Exchanges of Turkey (TOBB) President and EUROCHAMBRES Vice-President M. Rifat Hisarcıklıoğlu, ICI President Erdal Bahçıvan, President of the ICI Assembly and IKV Vice-Chair Zeynep Bodur Okyay as well as IKV Secretary-General Assoc. Prof. Çiğdem Nas and IKV Strategy and Business Development Director M. Gökhan Kilit participated in the meeting.

TOBB President M. Rifat Hisarcıklıoğlu delivered a speech with an emphasis on digital economy, education, the EU and R&D within the framework of the meeting.  In his speech, TOBB President Hisarcıklıoğlu pointed out that investing in education is investing in the future. TOBB President Hisarcıklıoğlu shared some figures underlining TOBB’s contribution to education in this regard. According to Hisarcıklıoğlu, TOBB invested 270 million Dollars in education in 81 cities of Turkey. TOBB President also touched upon the current stance of global and national economic outlook.

TOBB President Hisarcıklıoğlu said that every region except the USA was expected to increase its growth in 2020-2021 including Turkey. Mentioning high borrowing rate, TOBB President Hisarcıklıoğlu continued as follows: “The world had never been in this much debt before and this level of indebtedness carries a high level of risk.” And Hisarcıklıoğlu emphasized that the world needed a fair and stable growth model while a new economic and legal infrastructure was established. Finally, TOBB President Hisarcıklıoğlu shared his insights on Turkish economy. Underlining his expectation of 5 percent growth for the last quarter of the year, TOBB President Hisarcıklıoğlu referred to cyber attacks as an important risk factor and stated that precautions needed to be taken against those. TOBB President Hisarcıklıoğlu concluded his speech indicating Turkey’s Automobile project would act as a role model for the transformation of the industry.

ICI President Erdal Bahçıvan also touched upon the future of economy and technology in his speech. He said that a production-oriented understanding of economy should be made dominant in order to reduce future concerns in an era of transformation. He continued by underlining that a new world was taking shape through changes occurring in various fields, including science and technology. ICI President Bahçıvan indicated that information, innovation and quality had a crucial position during this period of change. He said: “Industrialism is rising in value again throughout the world with a next-generation understanding while competitiveness is increasing day by day. In such a period, we believe that Turkey should go towards an approach which is new and has broader horizons.” For this, ICI President Bahçıvan brought up qualified and sustainable growth as a necessary element.