hat is this about, the quality of the education at Harvard or the investment climate in Turkey? I vote for the second.

I have been thinking about this for a long time. It’s been lingering in a corner of my mind. It surfaced again with a recent piece of news. And here I ask: Why would a Harvard graduate return home and open a kebab house? Do you know the story? Let me tell you.

Doğuş Holding, one of the leading corporations in Turkey, has started to give weight to the restaurant business. The second-generation owner of the holding is a Harvard graduate. And he has started to concentrate on the kebab sector. Not that I don’t like the Günaydın restaurants. In fact, they are among the best restaurants in Turkey if the wine is good. But I can’t stop wondering.

Harvard is the best university. Everyone wants to go to Harvard. So, imagine you had a chance that can be enjoyed by only a few and went to graduate school at Harvard. Then you returned home. You have the financial means, as well. And what do you do? Open a kebab restaurant. Not that I look down on it. I know the value of a good kebab place or a good restaurant. But I have hard time understanding why, after all the education, one would choose to enter a sector with such low technology content and macroeconomic return. What is this about, the quality of the education at Harvard or the investment climate in Turkey? I vote for the second. I think the issue is related to fathers as much as it is to sons. Turkey’s investment climate fails to encourage high-value and high-technology production.

Some time ago I met a young Turkish entrepreneur who had started an IT business in the US and got it off the ground. He had studied at a top-class university and had opened the business as a student. He explained at length what his IT business did and how he had decided to sell it off. After he had sold the company, he returned home with the money. I asked him what he was doing in Turkey, expecting to hear that he had entered an innovative sector, an activity novel for Turkey, one with high technology content. Wouldn’t you expect so?  He said, “I took over my father’s profession, manufacturing windows and doors.” I was shocked. That was the first time I questioned what was wrong with Turkey’s investment climate. There is a defect, we have to admit it.

What do you think is the biggest indicator of the defect? Here is what I think: the share of high technology exports in Turkey’s overall exports is around four percent. If you are after a cold comfort, let me tell you that the share in Iran is less than two in a thousand. Good news, do you think? Then let’s add some others to the list: the shares of high technology in exports are 28 percent in South Korea and 24 percent in Israel. Their investment climates are conducive to high-tech production. Turkey’s isn’t. And there is more to the story. The price of high-technology exports per kilogram is around $12 in Turkey, compared to $10 in Iran and $53 in Korea. Not only is the share of high-tech low in Turkey, the price of it is around one-fourth of that of Korea. Turkey is incapable of high-technology production. Its seventh-grade-dropout labor force is able to produce a bundle of lame and cheap goods. This bodes ill, obviously. Turkey is in the same league as Iran! No need to say more.

Let’s go to the question in the headline: Why would a Harvard graduate prefer to open a kebab restaurant when he or she returns to Turkey? The famous Turkish singer İbrahim Tatlıses from the eastern city of Şanlıurfa once summed it up perfectly. In response to people who mocked him for being uneducated, he said, “It’s not like we had Oxford in Şanlıurfa, but I preferred not to study there.” So, let me adapt it to our case: is it that Turkey’s investment climate promoted high-technology production and the export reach was as far as Korea’s at around 7,000 kilometers, but Harvard graduates preferred to open kebab restaurants instead? Far from it! Turkey’s export reach is as short as a lame 3,000 kilometers and serving kebabs is much more profitable than engaging in high-tech production. It’s as simple as that. If a business is not sustainable, it cannot be sustained. Opening a kebab restaurant is a sustainable and profitable plan in Turkey’s conditions. That’s what is thought at Harvard: open sustainable and profitable businesses. The investment is solid and correct. As I said, it’s not the sons to blame; it is the fathers who did not take the precautions.

This commentary was published in Radikal daily on 27.12.2013