Speaking at the ASO congress, Babacan stated that “many crises in Turkey had internal reasons, that is to say, it was our fault. This crisis, however, had origins outside of Turkey, something for which we bore no responsibility. In fact, this external crisis is one that Turkey is facing after having made many strong economic reforms.” Babacan continued by noting that Turkey was the only G-20 country that didn’t give government support to banks. “Of the G-20 countries that met in Sweden two weeks ago, we were the only one that didn’t use public resources to support banks.”
“If we go back to the 1940s and ‘50s, we were comparable to South Korea economically. Now their national income is twice ours. They don’t possess more natural resources than we do nor do they have better human resources. The only reason for this gap is simple: instability,” stated Babacan. Babacan stressed that businessmen, industrialists and exporters needed stability, confidence and predictability in the economy for long-term investments. He noted that it was impossible to make similar plans 10 years ago.
