Antakya on path to become a name brand

The recently lifted visa requirements for travel between Turkey and Syria were high on the agenda of the 62nd Garanti Anatolia Meeting, which focused on the strengths and weaknesses of the southern city of Antakya.

The meeting also shed light on the hopes of Antakya, which is located near the Syrian border, to become a “brand city.”

“Antakya is among the 15 cities selected by the Culture and Tourism Ministry to be turned into a ‘brand city,’ which is exactly why we are here,” Nafiz Karadere, vice president of Garanti Bank, said during the Oct. 16 gathering, which is part of the bank’s corporate social-responsibility projects.

Antakya ranked 12th on the 2007-2008 Competitiveness Index compiled by the Center for Excellence in Competitiveness, Karadere said during the meeting. “With its commercial capabilities and production potential, the city ranks seventh. When it comes to proficiency in creating a brand and in innovations, it ranks 29th,” he added.

According to 2008 figures, said Hatay Governor Mehmet Celalettin Lekesiz, there are 677 export companies in Antakya. Last year’s exports totaled $1.78 billion, an increase of 47 percent over the previous year. The region also brought in $3.5 billion in imports, a 35 percent increase from a year earlier. Due to its wide variety of industries, including iron and steel production and agriculture, the city has high potential for growth and development, Lekesiz said.

“It is time for Antakya to carry on its proficiency in trade in order to become a brand,” said Karadere. The strongest parts of the Antakya economy are services, commerce, agriculture and logistics.

“The city on its own implements 25 percent of the country’s entire fresh fruit and vegetable exports,” said Karadere, who noted that Antakya has a perfect location connecting Mesopotamia to the Mediterranean region. “It should figure out ways to become a leader in the logistics industry,” he added.

“We held our first meeting in Antakya in 2003,” Karadere told the Hürriyet Daily News & Economic Review. “Since then we have seen a lot of improvement here… Antakya’s people are born with an entrepreneurial spirit.”

Antakya has long been known as a hub of religious and social tolerance, said Hikmet Çinçin, board chairman of the Antakya Chamber of Commerce and Industry. The Antakya Airport, opened in 2007, and the growing number of five-star hotels have also helped the economy, he said.

In order to help the city create a brand for itself, Çinçin said, 190 projects were initially developed. “The number was trimmed to 65 projects and seven committees consisting of 80 businesspeople were set up to work on those,” he added.

The visa-exemption deal signed Oct. 13 by Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Moallem and his Turkish counterpart Ahmet Davutoğlu in Aleppo enables Syrian and Turkish citizens to travel back and forth between the two countries. It also allows Turkish citizens to remain in Syria for up to three months.

“The infrastructure to regulate economic relations has been established," said Adnan Keçeci, Turkey’s consul general in Aleppo. “However, we still need time to create an environment of confidence [in order to have foreign investments]. The liberal economy concept is still not widespread in Syria.”

Currently, Syria will not allow a foreign company to enter the market in a 50/50 partnership with a local company, Keçeci said, limiting any foreign company to 49 percent. “Therefore, those eyeing the Syrian market for investment opportunities will have to be patient,” he added.

Creating a brand

Businesspeople and local authorities analyzed the economic structure of the city, revealing that the service industry holds a 66.1 percent share in the economy. Agriculture has a 19.1 percent share, while industry, consisting primarily of logistics, has a 14.3 percent share. The city follows Istanbul’s lead in international logistics business, ranking second in Turkey, and has 9,000 tractor-trailers at its disposal.

Tourism is another strong point, with faith tourism bringing more income than any other to the city, which has long been home to different cultures and religions. Located in the Orontes Valley at the foot of Mt. Silpius, Antakya is home to a cave church known as St. Peter’s Grotto, where the first Christian community met. The city also holds a synagogue, an Orthodox church, a Catholic church and a mosque, lined up practically side-by-side on its main road.

Tourism has been developing quite rapidly for the past 15 years, said İskender Çayla, general manager of the Retur travel agency. Currently, there are 23 hotels with a bed capacity of 2,028, he said, adding that there is a significant need to focus on publicity: “What Turkey needs are cities that stand out with their individual characteristics.”

Home to various civilizations since 5500 B.C., Antakya’s cultural diversity, tolerance and rich cuisine are among the things that set it apart, Çayla said. The absence of a city logo and an updated foreign-language Web site are among the hurdles, he feels, to promoting such assets. Çayla also pointed to the low number of tourism-information offices and said participation in international fairs is a must.

Tour guide Hüseyin Alantar told the Daily News that he was not optimistic that the city’s publicity efforts would improve any time soon. “It would be difficult to promote Antakya, because the rest of Turkey has not been able to promote itself like Istanbul, where everything one can imagine exists, from historical buildings to art galleries and social life,” he said.

Likewise, although Antakya has achieved quite a lot in the logistics industry, it still has not attained its full potential, said logistics management advisor Atilla Yıldıztekin. He believes Antakya could easily be a logistics hub between East and West, North and South.

“The city needs to focus more on innovations related to this industry,” Yıldıztekin said. “A logistic strategy has to be determined. Short- and medium-term targets need to be named. The labor force needs to be trained and a logistics complex must be set up.” The İskenderun harbor could also be turned into an intermodal hub, connecting the highways to the sea lane, he added.

The agriculture industry also still has significant troubles when it comes to fresh-fruit and vegetable production, according to Ali Kavak, board chairman of the Mediterranean Fresh Fruit and Vegetable Exporters’ Union.

“Among the 630 exporter companies in Hatay, 150 are fresh-fruit and vegetable exporters. However, we obtain nearly 90 percent of the products we export from neighboring cities,” he said. “Our production of fresh fruits and vegetables is not enough.”

“I believe that once a company starts increasing its focus on fresh-fruit and vegetable production, others will follow,” Kavak told the Daily News. “Currently the region’s agriculture is focused on legumes, cotton, mint and parsley. Our farmers need to seek alternatives.”