Turkey is praised to shine like a star. But observations and praises do not match.

It is impossible not to be surprised about praises about Turkey's economy. Just recently Turkey's economy is praised to shine like a star. We of course wished this was true. However, observations and praises do not match.

This implies a huge danger. More and more people start to believe that Turkey has easily overcome the crisis and ensured rapid growth, pioneered the rest of the world in this respect and maintained an 'unprecedented' dynamism. Since the faith replaces the reality, it is forgotten what Turkey has to do actually to shine like a star. After all, if you already shine like a star, you would no longer aim to shine like a star.

Circumstances force me to address all the same figures at this column. There is nothing I do; this is a necessity. So, let us see what figures indicate: Average growth rate Turkey assured over the last six decades is 4.7 percent (growth rate in 2010 is foreseen to be 7 percent). Now, let us divide this period into two sub-periods: 1950-2001 and 2002-2010. We see that average growth rate in the first sub-period is similar and average growth rate in the 2002-2010 period is 4.5 percent. 

If we are satisfied with the performance over the last six decades or eight years, we can keep doing what we are doing. Of course satisfaction changes from person to person. But we can set an objective criterion and compare our performance with other countries. I have provided a number of such comparisons so far. So let me skip the details and give the result.

Over the last six decades, the per capita income gap between developed countries and Turkey has neither closed nor widened. This is the case despite the 4.7 percent growth average Turkey achieved. On the other hand, China, Korea and Ireland succeeded in closing or easing this gap. We have made no progress while they advanced. So under these circumstances if there is a country 'shining like a star' that country is definitely not Turkey. 

Praises about Turkey's performance during the global crisis also do not match with the reality. Concerning their performance in recovering from the crisis, countries that hold 90 percent of world's income are classified under four groups: Economies growing in the face of the crisis; severely-affected but rapid-recoverer countries; severely-affected and slow-recoverer countries; severely-affected non-recoverer countries. Turkey is not in the first group. Turkey is not in the second group, either. Turkey performs at a stage in between the second and the third group.

Such is the status quo. It appears that those who prepared the medium term program are satisfied with the status quo. This is such at least for two reasons: first, targeted growth rates for the next three years are not much different than the current rates: 4.5, 5 and 5.5 percent, respectively. Second, list of actions supposed to be devoted to change the status quo are not credible. Though some areas of reform are numerated, they are not prioritized in any sense. Neither the funds to allocate for reforms nor the concrete steps to take are stated. Writing the topics down does not qualify as actually making the reform. This is only letting things drift. It seems that decision makers have a deep faith in 'Turkey's dynamism'. This is such a dynamism that assures a 'static' position for Turkey before developed countries. Let's hope the best!

This commentary was published in Radikal daily on 08.11.2010