Gov’t to announce economic program
Güncelleme Tarihi:
by Ümit Enginsoy
Oluşturulma Tarihi: Mart 06, 2009 00:00
WASHINGTON - The government is getting ready to introduce three important documents involving the economy within the next month, Nazım Ekren, deputy prime minister responsible for the economy, tells reporters in Washington. Fiscal discipline will be restored in the medium term, he promises
The government will be able to restore fiscal discipline, disrupted in Turkey like elsewhere in the world due to the economic crisis, only in the medium term, a top economic official visiting the United States said late Wednesday.
Nazım Ekren, deputy prime minister responsible for the economy, said the government was preparing to release three important economic documents within the next month.
"The three documents are a three-year pre-accession [to the European Union] economic program, an update on the medium-term economic program and a medium-term fiscal plan, that will explain how fiscal discipline will be restored in the medium term," he told a meeting of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a think tank here.
Ekren, a close aide to Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, is on a visit here mainly to meet with the economic team of new U.S. President Barack Obama.
He will meet today with Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and Christina Romer, who heads Obama's Council of Economic Advisers.
The global economic crisis, which started last year as a financial turmoil in the United States, now has hit the real economies of all countries around the world, including Turkey.
Many nations introduced costly economic stimulus packages this year to revive demand as part of efforts to restore their economies, but such programs have caused an inevitable worsening in fiscal discipline.
Ekren said Turkey’s economy, which survived another crisis in 2001 with the help of International Monetary Fund-backed programs, performed well between 2002 and 2008, but that now its real economy and trade, particularly with Europe, were damaged. Turkey's latest arrangement with the IMF, a stand-by agreement backed by more than $10 billion from the Fund, ended successfully last May, and the two sides have been working on a follow-up stand-by amid the global crisis since last fall. But no agreement has so far been reached.
Reluctant to sign a deal
Analysts suggest that Erdoğan's government is reluctant to undergo a new stand-by's obligations toward fiscal discipline buy cutting public expenses before Turkey's nationwide local elections on March 29. But Ekren suggested the IMF process had no relation with the elections, and that technical talks between Turkish authorities and the international lender were continuing.
"There are no serious differences at this point" with the Fund, he said.
He said he had met with Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the IMF's managing director, earlier in the day, discussing Turkey's relationship with the Fund and preparations for the IMF's and the World Bank's planned Fall Meetings, scheduled to be held in Istanbul in October, and a G20 leaders summit in London next month.
The G20 brings together the world's top 19 economies, including Turkey, and the European Union. The G20 had its first summit about the global crisis in Washington last November.
"We would like Turkey's recovery from its 2001 crisis to be discussed at the G20" as a potential model in overcoming the present crisis, Ekren said.
Nazım Ekren, deputy prime minister responsible for the economy, said the government was preparing to release three important economic documents within the next month.
"The three documents are a three-year pre-accession [to the European Union] economic program, an update on the medium-term economic program and a medium-term fiscal plan, that will explain how fiscal discipline will be restored in the medium term," he told a meeting of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a think tank here.
Ekren, a close aide to Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, is on a visit here mainly to meet with the economic team of new U.S. President Barack Obama.
He will meet today with Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and Christina Romer, who heads Obama's Council of Economic Advisers.
The global economic crisis, which started last year as a financial turmoil in the United States, now has hit the real economies of all countries around the world, including Turkey.
Many nations introduced costly economic stimulus packages this year to revive demand as part of efforts to restore their economies, but such programs have caused an inevitable worsening in fiscal discipline.
Ekren said Turkey’s economy, which survived another crisis in 2001 with the help of International Monetary Fund-backed programs, performed well between 2002 and 2008, but that now its real economy and trade, particularly with Europe, were damaged. Turkey's latest arrangement with the IMF, a stand-by agreement backed by more than $10 billion from the Fund, ended successfully last May, and the two sides have been working on a follow-up stand-by amid the global crisis since last fall. But no agreement has so far been reached.
Reluctant to sign a deal
Analysts suggest that Erdoğan's government is reluctant to undergo a new stand-by's obligations toward fiscal discipline buy cutting public expenses before Turkey's nationwide local elections on March 29. But Ekren suggested the IMF process had no relation with the elections, and that technical talks between Turkish authorities and the international lender were continuing.
"There are no serious differences at this point" with the Fund, he said.
He said he had met with Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the IMF's managing director, earlier in the day, discussing Turkey's relationship with the Fund and preparations for the IMF's and the World Bank's planned Fall Meetings, scheduled to be held in Istanbul in October, and a G20 leaders summit in London next month.
The G20 brings together the world's top 19 economies, including Turkey, and the European Union. The G20 had its first summit about the global crisis in Washington last November.
"We would like Turkey's recovery from its 2001 crisis to be discussed at the G20" as a potential model in overcoming the present crisis, Ekren said.