Significant Increase in Disinfectant Exports

Turkey's manufacturing strength demonstrated anew during pandemic period. Production in health and hygiene supplies in particular provided the country with significant foreign exchange inflows during coronavirus days when the world shut down.

Disinfectant and cologne exports broke historic records by a factor of ten. According to İKMİB data, disinfectant export figures rose from USD 8.6 million in January-April 2019 to USD 90 million in the same period this year. A similar situation holds for cologne. In the same periods, cologne exports increased from USD 2.7 million to USD 7.5 million. On the subject, İKMİB Board Chairman Adil Pelister made the following statement: "During these extraordinary times we are passing through, we have once again witnessed the strength of our chemical sector, Turkey's second largest export sector. Despite export restrictions during the pandemic, we experienced an increase exceeding 10-fold compared to January-April of last year, particularly in disinfectant exports. Disinfectant export figures rose from USD 8.6 million in January-April 2019 to USD 90 million in the same period this year. For cologne, exports increased from USD 2.7 million in the same periods to USD 7.5 million. Against the backdrop of normalization processes gradually making themselves felt worldwide and in our country, we believe that habits regarding cleanliness, hygiene and disinfectants will become established. This upward trend will also contribute to the addition of new production lines. In the domestic market, demand for these products increased by 30-40 percent in April, and some companies made rapid adaptations and shifted focus to these items that they did not produce or produced in limited quantities, in line with demand. Moreover, with the removal of pre-approval requirements for medical, cosmetic and chemical substance exports as of 2 May, our export processes will accelerate again. As İKMİB, we made significant contributions to this with our sector NGOs. We will begin to see the positive effects of this in the coming months. We believe that recovery will occur with the gradual normalization process in May and June. With the new normalization period, it is very important that we continue to work together, produce and export to turn the positive perception of our country in managing this process into an opportunity in the period ahead. We believe new opportunities will emerge both for our sector and for our country."