[MONDAY TALK]
Academic says Turkey should start customs union with EU in agriculture

For Monday Talk, he elaborated on why it is the right time for Turkey to make such an agreement and if it is achievable while also commenting on Turkey’s changing social and political dynamics in its EU accession process.

Those who attended Turkish schools were taught that Turkey is mainly an agricultural country, a self-sufficient country agriculturally, and that it has vast agricultural land with a wide variety of produce. Last week the news was about worries due to depleting stocks of staple foods both in Turkey and many other countries. How can we make sense of this?

The conviction that Turkey is mainly an agricultural country is both right and wrong. It is right that Turkey is an agricultural country culturally, but when you look at its agricultural productivity practices and when you look at its consumers’ dietary habits, we can hardly say that it’s an agricultural country. Maybe it is the biggest lie in Turkish history that Turkey is agriculturally self-sufficient.

What does being ‘agriculturally self-sufficient’ mean?

In Turkey annual wheat consumption is about 18 million tons; therefore, we know Turkey won’t see a crisis over wheat in the near future. Turkey won’t have a famine like in Somalia. But it’s a shame if our only criterion is not having a famine situation in a country like Turkey. Self-sufficiency in Western terms has been evaluated by standards such as meat, fish and fresh vitamin C product consumption per person. When we look at these standards, we can see that Turkey is way behind developed countries.

How can we compare the place that agricultural production holds within general production in Turkey and in the European Union?

Let’s look at the EU-15 -- before the EU became a 27-state bloc -- where agriculture was 3 percent of its general production. This 3 percent was produced by 7 million people. That means there were 7 million agricultural workers. In Turkey, too, there are 7 million agricultural workers. About 11 percent of our national income comes from agriculture. Our national income is roughly $600 billion and 10 percent of this is $60 billion. In Turkey, 7 million people work to obtain $60 billion worth of agricultural output. In the EU-15, 7 million people worked to obtain $360 billion worth of agricultural output. This means productivity, which is production divided by the number of people.

Turkey seems to have a long way to go to meet the EU standards, is it impossible?

One of the most difficult chapters in Turkey’s accession negotiations with the EU is related to agriculture. It requires a common agricultural policy but it is very costly. The EU’s common agricultural policy aims at increasing productivity so it can finance Turkey when it joins the group. Turkey does not yet comprehend the difficulties entailed with this harmonization. I suggest having a customs union in agricultural products and services -- before Turkey adopts the EU’s common agricultural policy -- because we have certain conditions, such as the price hikes, that make it the right time for Turkey.

Is a customs union with the EU in agricultural production promising?

Turkey has mistakenly been maintaining subsidies in its agricultural policies for wheat, sugar beet and tobacco since the 1950s. Turkey still produces mainly wheat, sugar beet and tobacco, all of which do not yield good financial gains, even for their producers. Turkey should have changed its agricultural production structure in consideration of global competitiveness. This misguided subsidy policy has prevented Turkey’s agricultural integration with the world. Now is the right time for a breakthrough. Because of certain factors such as climate change, agricultural production has been decreasing; wheat and rice stocks in particular have dropped. Turkey can present a proposal to start a customs union in agricultural production.

Could this be done without waiting for the negotiation chapters on agriculture to be opened?

Yes, just as it has been done in the customs union agreement that came long before negotiations started. We should recall the group who has been against a customs union in agricultural products; it was the agricultural producers who were against it because they were worried that EU prices would adversely affect them. Now the prices are so high there can be no such fears. The EU also has overstocks of almost every food item. The EU is highly productive; it can produce more with less people. Turkey can take a step ahead with a customs union agreement with the EU in agricultural products and find a permanent solution to the approaching food crisis. This has also been suggested for the future in the customs union agreement, which started on Jan. 1, 1996.

Do you think both sides would be amenable to this type of customs union?

I don’t know if the EU will be as willing as it was in the past. It was Turkey that did not cooperate with the EU on this. Now Turkey can do it to avoid the coming agricultural crisis but I don’t know the official thoughts regarding this.

What do you think may prevent Turkey from moving forward with this?

Well, with a customs union on agricultural products, pricing calculations would be done in Brussels not in Ankara. Politically it would be risky. Votes from the agricultural sector have counted a lot for politicians.

Would ultra-nationalists be against a customs union for agricultural products?

They might be, but this would be nonsensical because nationalism is meaningful only if you first guarantee food security for your citizens.

In your observations, you often refer to the changing dynamics in Turkey when it comes to support for Turkey’s EU accession process. Could you elaborate on this?

In Turkey there has never been mass support for the European Union. Let’s admit that only a small diplomatic corps in the Foreign Ministry carried out efforts in that regard. The Turkish business sector was alive only with protectionism and they were against the EU, which would bring competitiveness. I’ve already mentioned the agricultural sector’s approach, which was concerned about prices. The labor movement saw job losses in the short term if Turkey entered the EU accession process. It was wrong but that’s how they perceived it. Bureaucracy was against the EU for fear of losing its influence. The Republican People’s Party (CHP) has been against the EU because it claimed Turkey would lose its national sovereignty even though the EU project is all about giving up national sovereignty. The National View (”Milli Görüş”) was against the EU because it would define the nation as an assembly of believers. The Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) was against it because of its ultra-nationalistic line. Up until the 1990s outside of a small diplomatic corps and [former President and Prime Minister Turgut] Özal, not many have understood the importance of Turkey’s EU process. And as we have seen, the process, even though it started in the 1950s, went nowhere.

What happened to change it in the 1990s?

In the process, the Copenhagen criteria came in 1993 [requiring that a state have the institutions to preserve democratic governance and human rights, have a functioning market economy and accept the obligations and intent of the EU]. And the Feb. 28 process reminded us again that the space for those who wanted to live their own conservative lives was so narrow. Another important thing was that in the 1990s, Anatolian businesses started exporting to the EU due to the fact that Turkey was in the customs union, and they started to see the EU process as a guarantee for their capital. The Turkish Industrialists and Businessmen’s Association (TÜSİAD) was also among the first to realize that staying out of the EU process would do no good. But the military bureaucracy and the judicial bureaucracy have continued to show great opposition. The workers in the agricultural sector have continued their opposition. And small and medium-sized businesses have continued their opposition. But the opposition has been split and it’s not unified as in the pre-’90s period. On the other hand, a considerable number of liberal democrats, Kurds, Anatolian businessmen and some of TÜSİAD support the EU process.

So who are the elite who oppose Turkey’s EU entry process that you speak about in your articles?

If you define elites as those close to the state -- you might argue whether or not this definition is correct -- they have not liked the political formulation of the Copenhagen criteria. These concrete demands from Turkey were maddening for the elite. The big fight goes on. In the last couple of months, we have seen indications that military and judicial bureaucracies have taken a step forward.

Which side do you think will be more successful?

I don’t think we should read all the politics related to freedom for the headscarf and closing of the Justice and Development Party (AK Party) from the perspective of secularism. I think there is another fight going on underneath and that is a fight between an open and closed society. The fight has been going on in relation to the EU process, and the so-called elites have been continuing their fight over secularism so as not to lose their legitimacy. Otherwise, how could the military and judicial bureaucracy, under the name of Atatürk, oppose the EU, which is the most concrete and contemporary institution of the West. If they do, a legitimacy crisis would occur. Therefore, they carry on their oppositional arguments over the secularism debate. This is a political battle. The EU project is the project that will change the structure of society the most. Some people don’t like this change and oppose it. We’ll see where this will go.

Why have you recommended that a March 15 article in The Economist be translated into Turkish and be printed in all Turkish newspapers?

It was titled “Economy and the rule of law,” and it said economic growth will be consistent and sustained as long as the concept of rule of law has been adopted. This means we cannot think of growth and the rule of law as separate from one another. And today Turkey has a $300 billion trade volume, about $700 billion national income, $20 billion foreign capital inflow; it has been having accession negotiations with the EU on 35 chapters; it has been in a customs union with the EU for 12 years and it is the 15th biggest economy of the world. Having such a position in the world requires a parallel judiciary structure. But some things in Turkey, including the 1982 constitution, freedom of expression issues and the Constitutional Court’s decisions about foreign capital investments in Turkey, are not consistent with the economic development level of the country. This disconnectedness cannot continue. The economic level and national judiciary level should be in harmony with each other.

Which one do you think will be at the forefront?

If the growth rate becomes 2 or 3 percent a year in the next 10 years in Turkey, the economic level would drop down to the level of the judiciary, making the bureaucracy the most powerful. In the short run, it seems like the bureaucracy is ahead but the world cannot carry it like this. In the past, periphery countries like Turkey were seen as weak states but now this has changed. The US and the EU want to see stability in Turkey in this geography. And stability means a fast-growing Turkey. And the road toward this goal goes through the EU. Turkey will overcome the difficulties in the mid-term with global support.

Eser Karakaş

Professor of economics at Bahçeşehir University, his fields of concentration are the theory of public economics and finances of the European Union. He also heads Bahçeşehir University’s European Union division.

He writes columns for various newspapers and appears on television as a commentator on mainly EU-related issues. He has written several books on Turkey’s political and economic system, including “Normalization, Turkey in the European Union Process,” (Normalleşme, Avrupa Birliği Sürecinde Türkiye), 2004, and “Civilian Politics, Global Economy,” (Sivil Siyaset, Küresel Ekonomi), 2004.