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Similarly imports in the same period surged from $54.5 billion to $137.4 billion. The volume of trade increased to almost $223 billion from $82 billion, making the share of exports, imports and trade volumes in gross domestic product (GDP) 22 percent, 35.2 percent and 55.7 percent, respectively (see Table 1). These findings emphasize that Turkey’s trade integration is much higher than that of many Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) countries. Moreover, these figures indicate that Turkey has become a champion in terms of increasing its export performance among the major emerging market economies. An interesting observation is that the EU’s (25) share of Turkey’s exports is not growing. Actually, it is the rates of increase in exports to some “alternative” trade destinations are showing the most dramatic growth for Turkey (see Figure 2).
 
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