Food Turkey Magazine September 2017

TGDF Chairman Kopuz:
“Food industry is being
turned into a target”
Chairman of the Turkish Food and Drink Industry Associations
Federation (TGDF), Semsi Kopuz said that everyone, having any
background knowledge or not, are unjustly blaming the food industry
for inflation: “Some people are almost leading a campaign to discredit
food industry in the eyes of the society.”
The annual evaluation meeting of the
Turkish Food and Drink Industry Associations
Federation (TGDF) was held
on May 17.
TGDF is the most competent representative
of the food sector with 26
associations as its members. In the
meeting, the Chairman of TGDF, Şemsi
Kopuz, assessed the subjects in the
agenda of food industry, while the Secretary
General, İlknur Menlik, shared
the latest data regarding European
and Turkish Food Industry, citing from
“Turkish Food and Drink Industry Inventory
2016” published by Gıdahattı.
European Food and Drink
Industry
According to Menlik; European Food
and Drink Industry, as the largest sector
of EU in terms of turnover, value
added and employment, is creating
jobs to 4.25 million people with
289,000 enterprises, 1,089 billion euros
turnover and more than 150 billion
euros foreign trade.
European Food and Drink Industry
had an export volume of 98.1 billion
euros in 2015, where the foreign trade
surplus became 25.2 billion euros.
Global food and beverage exports increased
by more than 2 folds between
56 FOOD TURKEY September 2017
Semsi Kopuz
2005 and 2014; with the largest exporters
being EU, US, China and Brazil.
The largest importers were US, EU,
Japan, China and Canada at the same
time period.
Turkish Food and Drink
Industry
According to the “Annual Industrial and
Service Statistics 2015” released by the
TUIK in 2016, More than 485 people
are employed in the 42,520 enterprises
operating in the Turkish Food and
Drink Industry. The total production of
enterprises rose from TL 152.4 billion
in 2014 to TL 171.4 billion in 2015, increasing
by 12.5 percent.