World Turkish Business Council Congress will accelerate foreign trade: DEIK president

By Ergin Garip

ISTANBUL (AA) - The 10th World Turkish Business Council (DTIK) Congress will not only provide an opportunity for strengthening friendships but is expected to fulfill a very important task in terms of increasing trade, the president of Türkiye's Foreign Economic Relations Board (DEIK) said Sunday.

Operating under the umbrella of DEIK and chaired by its president, Nail Olpak, the council will host the congress in Istanbul on Sept. 15 and 16, bringing together the most successful names in the Turkish diaspora who have made a global impact.

The event, which will be attended by Turkish and Türkiye-friendly business executives living abroad, managers of international companies, entrepreneurs, economists, experts, artists, athletes, politicians, bureaucrats and academicians, will bring together more than 2,000 representatives of the diaspora.

Olpak told Anadolu there are more than 6 million members of the Turkish diaspora living settled lives around the world and said they are predominately in Germany, followed by France, the Netherlands and Austria.

Noting that there are differences from country to country due to the formation of the diaspora structure, he said: "We can associate the diaspora with concepts such as migration and being forced to migrate. However, we see it as the power created by migration rather than migration."

"How can we evaluate this migration as soft power? As DEIK and DTIK, we are working for this power to play the most effective role for Türkiye," he added.

Pointing out the importance of cooperation with friendly diasporas, Olpak said that Azerbaijan, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Pakistan and Hungary are nations with a strong diaspora connection to Türkiye.

He said Türkiye should leverage its diaspora strength more actively and effectively.

"There is a very large Turkish population in Germany, but we have a diaspora in many countries outside Germany," he stressed.

"For example, we have a diaspora of over 400,000 people living in France. The Armenian population in France is almost as big. If we ask each other whether we have influence or what the perception is, unfortunately our influence there is not at the level we would like.

“There may be different reasons for this. But as DTIK, we are affected by the country where our diaspora is located. We want it to be the one influencing the decision-making mechanism of the country, rather than the other way around,” he added.

Olpak said that as the businesspeople, athletes and academics within the Turkish diaspora become more influential in the country they live in rather than being affected, the way will be paved for the diaspora to become a more effective soft power.

He said Türkiye's most important asset to achieve its goals is its manpower.

"With this understanding, we see our 6 million citizens living abroad as an indispensable element of power.

“As the Turkish business world, we must unite our citizens living in diaspora around the same global goals and in line with these goals," he stressed.

Olpak said DTIK was established in 1996 to unite Turks living abroad around common goals and noted that it is a unifying force as a platform rather than an umbrella organization.

Touching on the event, he said they will bring together more than 2,000 guests from abroad and business people from Türkiye with both panels and B2B meetings.

"We will not only talk about the diaspora. We aim to increase the power of our diaspora by integrating our businesspeople living abroad with the businesspeople in the country.

"In other words, we have prepared a program that will enable our participants to be active."

He said that DEIK continues its activities in a very wide geography to strengthen the dynamics of the Turkish economy and to carry the power of the country to the world.

During the event, opportunities for the Turkish diaspora and problems faced by the diaspora will be discussed by experienced entrepreneurs, experts, academics and representatives of public institutions, he noted.

Within the scope of the congress, which will be attended by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, a panel titled "Organization of Turkic States: 5 States One Diaspora" will be held under the chairmanship of the Secretary General of the Organization of Turkic States (OTS), Kubanchbek Omuraliyev.

The panel will be attended by the economy, trade, industry and foreign affairs ministers and officials from Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Hungary, the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC), Turkmenistan and Türkiye.

*Writing by Gokhan Ergocun