Shifts in the supply chains provide new opportunities to the Turkish SMEs.

According to the data announced by the Netherlands Bureau for Economic Policy Analysis (CPB),world trade volume showed a strong recovery with a 10.3% growth in 2021 after the 5.2% contraction in 2020. In this way, world trade volume exceeded the pre-pandemic peak level in 2018 by approximately 4%.

The US and China came to the fore in terms of recovery in the global trade volume with the former increasing its imports by approximately 11.5% and the latter by approximately 20%. Furthermore, the 9.3% increase in the import volume of the Eurozone has been a significant factor supporting the performance of Turkish SMEs.

The recovery in the global trade volume was also stemmed from the pent-up demand supported by monetary and fiscal policies, as well as from the increased orders due to the additional demand for inputs and concerns about supply safety that emerged along with the change in the global supply chains. As is well known, the buyers started to reduce their intensive dependence on Asia to ensure supply safety and consequently diversified their supply sources, which resulted in nearshoring.

In line with these trends, the Turkish industry was chosen as a significant alternative supplier for the buyers worldwide, and thus a high level of demand occurred for the Turkish industrial products.

In line with these developments, Turkish SMEs achieved a significant success in exports. In 2021, the exports by ISO Second 500 enterprises increased faster than the total exports of Türkiye and of ISO 500 enterprises. Turkish SMEs benefited at maximum levels from the opportunities created by their flexible structures and changes in the supply chains both at home and abroad, and new trends like supply from domestic sources, regionalization and nearshoring.