The China visit by Mr. Abdullah Gul, our President, and a council of businessmen accompanying him on June 24th to 29th was very successful and useful in all aspects.
The gesture bestowed by Mr. Abdullah Gul, our President, on our businessmen, was simply unbelievable. In the speech he delivered in Beijing, he said: “In my capacity as the President of Turkish Republic, I am more than ready and willing to give my guarantee for and stand behind my businessmen for the successful outcome of any investment or cooperation by every and each businessman here with me in China.”
This personal guarantee astonished both Turkish and Chinese businessmen as this kind of back-up was provided by Mr. Turgut Ozal only in the past. This kind of approach, that is, “I back up and guarantee for my businessman”, has been displayed by no one else. Thanks to the rippling effects of this approach, we managed to make business deals of 4 billion dollars during the Chinese journey. Our businessmen made deals to act as agencies of several companies, which means a very good start for partnership.
Mr. Hu Jintao, the President of China, asked us what our population reached this year, and we responded him, saying that we were 70 million people. He was pleased, saying that it was a nice thing that everyone knew the other.
We, Turkish businessmen, think that our country is a great one in all aspects. I think this is because we compare ourselves with European countries. The USA is of course a very big country in terms of both population and surface area. But China is entirely something else. In every plant we have visited we noticed thousands of employees, ten thousand, twenty thousand, forty thousand. Their perspective towards future is very wide angled. While the entire world, including Turkey, shrank by 13.8%, China is a country galloping ahead with a growth rate of 6.1%. My life will be probably over by then but China will reach 50.000 dollars per capita in near future. I think that every Turkish businessman should definitely visit China for inspiration and enhancing his vision.
Following a ten-day travel, we saw upon our return to Turkey that same people were discussing same things without going nowhere. We appear to be busy with domestic rumors and fights. While the rest of the world is flying, we are still toddling. We should immediately push aside these issues and all of us, that is, Turkish people, Turkish businessmen, Turkish physicians, Turkish workers, Turkish engineers and Turkish students, should brainstorm and take immediate steps to find out how to create added value for our country...before it is too late.