Tag: petrol import

Turkey stops publishing details of oil imports from Iran

Turkey’s refiner Tupras has urged the country’s statistics agency to stop divulging details of its oil imports from Iran amid US sanctions on Tehran’s oil sector over its nuclear energy program.

Turkey says it stops publishing details of the country’s oil imports from Iran.(file photo)

The Turkish Statistical Institute (TUIK) stopped detailing its oil imports in late December and released only figures for total monthly imports.

“Tupras asked us last month not to reveal the origin of our crude oil imports and instead give an overall figure,” a TUIK official said, requesting anonymity.

“We were not informed of the reason for the change in policy,” he said.

Tupras officials and TUIK declined to comment on the issue.

Before the change in policy, Tupras had received two Iranian crude cargoes of 145,000 tons and one of 140,000 tons at the Tutunciftlik import terminal.

At the beginning of 2012, the US and the European Union imposed new sanctions on Iran’s oil and financial sectors with the goal of preventing other countries from purchasing Iranian oil and conducting transactions with the Central Bank of Iran.

On October 15, 2012, the EU foreign ministers reached an agreement on another round of sanctions against Iran.

The United States granted 180-day waivers on Iran oil sanctions to Turkey on December 7, 2012.

The illegal US-engineered sanctions were imposed based on the unfounded accusation that Iran is pursuing non-civilian objectives in its nuclear energy program.

Iran rejects the allegations, arguing that as a committed signatory to the Non-Proliferation Treaty and a member of the International Atomic Energy Agency, it has the right to use nuclear technology for peaceful purposes.

SF/AZ/MA

via PressTV – Turkey stops publishing details of oil imports from Iran.

January 6, 2013
Iran now Turkey’s premier oil supplier

TEHRAN, May 31 (UPI) — In a development fraught with significance for Turkish-U.S. relations, Iran has become Turkey’s leading provider of crude oil.

Turkey’s Energy Market Regulatory Authority noted the development in a report, the Tehran Times reported Tuesday.

The development represents a new challenge for the United States, which has repeatedly tightened sanctions on Iran over its nuclear energy program. Tehran insists the program is for peaceful purposes but Washington and other Western countries, maintain that it conceals a covert nuclear weapons program.

During the period January-March, EPDK reported that Iran exported more than 1.8 million tons of crude oil to Turkey, accounting for 30 percent of Turkey’s crude imports.

During the first two months of 2011, bilateral trade between Iran and Turkey surpassed $2.1 billion, while in 2010 bilateral trade value was worth $10.6 billion in 2010, a 97 percent increase over 2009 statistics.

The Turkish Statistical Institute reported that bilateral trade value will surpass $15 billion in 2011 under the terms of a preferential trade agreement.

© 2011 United Press International, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Any reproduction, republication, redistribution and/or modification of any UPI content is expressly prohibited without UPI’s prior written consent.

via Iran now Turkey’s premier oil supplier – UPI.com.

June 1, 2011
Lack of technological goods production widens Turkey’s imports

ISTANBUL – Anatolia News Agency

This file photo shows customers at the opening day of a technology shop in central Istanbul. Electronic goods in Turkey are usually imported. Hürriyet photos

Turkey paid a total of $29.45 billion over the last five years for 18 items that are not produced in the domestic market, according to a recent report from the Istanbul Chamber of Certified Public Accountants, or ISMMMO.

High-technology products led by helicopters, aircraft, mobile phones and laptops, constitute a great part of Turkey’s imports, in addition to mines, agricultural products and energy resources such as oil, according to the report. The “Turkey’s Industrial Production and Facts” report is prepared as a result of an extensive observation of 3,000 different industrial items.

“Instead of allocating billions of dollars each year to imports, Turkey should attach more importance to research and development studies and prevent brain drain,” said Yahya Arıkan, chairman of the İSMMMO. “We cannot even produce watches or devises used for measuring blood pressure.”

Helicopters and aircrafts have led Turkey’s imported industrial products list for the last five years, followed by mobile phones in the second spot. Turkey paid a total of $8.4 million for helicopter and aircraft imports between 2006 and 2010 and $6.9 million for mobile phone imports.

Turkey is experiencing a great weakness and economic loss with high-technology products, the report said, adding that the country pays billions of dollars to foreign countries each year to import many technological products.

Turkey pays some $7.8 billion each year to import a total of 18 products that cannot be produced in the domestic market, the report said. The amount paid abroad totaled nearly $30 billion over the last five years, according to the report.

High-technology products lead by optical instruments, medical imaging devices, printers and copier machines and consumer electronics such as mobile phones and digital cameras are considerably imported from the Eastern Asian countries, the report said. According to the report, laptops come in the third spot with a total cost of $4.4 million, followed by informatic product components with $2.6 million. Printers, scanners and copier machines totaling $1.4 million are the other technological products in the list. The watch sector’s imports also have quite a big share, representing $1 million in the total amount.

Recalling the domestic automobile production debate, Arıkan said, “Before this discussion, we should discuss our economy, which is unable to produce cameras, motorboats, lenses for cameras, blood pressure gauges and even watches.

“Turkey can produce technology,” Arıkan said. “Specialization, cooperation, planning and investments are needed. We can reach prosperity and social stability only by complying with technological revolutions.”

May 31, 2011
Oil Spike May Take a While to Punish Energy-Hungry Turkey

By Joe Parkinson

Adem Altan/AFP/Getty Images An employee made a routine check at a natural gas control center of Turkey’s Petroleum and Pipeline Corporation, west of Ankara, Turkey.

ISTANBUL — Pundits in the U.S. regularly bemoan America’s “addiction to foreign oil” — but for a more unlikely energy addict, take a look at Turkey.

Turkey imports 87% of its petrol, 85% of its coal and a whopping 97% of its natural gas, meaning that when energy prices rise, the economy is exposed. So this year’s 20% gain in oil prices propelled by the wave of unrest sweeping the Middle East should have set the alarm bells ringing in Ankara.

But analysts at BGC capital partners say financial pain from spiralling oil is likely to take at least a year to fully feed through to Turkey’s real economy. That gives policymakers here valuable breathing room before national elections scheduled for June. But it also suggests that Turkey’s fast-growing economy could next year face a painful inflation spike and a further deterioration of its gaping current account deficit.

In a research note published Wednesday, BCG calculates that Turkey’s energy addiction cost it $91 billion last year, or 12.4% of gross domestic product. As a consequence, the economy’s dependence on energy imports means that for every $10 rise in Brent crude, Turkey’s growth will be reduced by up to 0.5%.

Turkey’s rapidly growing economy, which expanded 8.9% last year, could perhaps afford a little deceleration. Record low inflation in February and gradually falling unemployment underline the economy’s strong rebound from recession. But BCG research says surging oil prices could next year shock output, stocks and confidence. More troubling for Tukey’s policymakers: a sustained oil spike would further pressurize Turkey’s current account deficit — the achilles heel of the rapidly-growing economy.

Turkey’s current account deficit widened 247% to a record high of $48.6 billion last year as domestic demand boomed and imports dramatically outpaced exports. The swelling deficit has fed market concern that the economy could be exposed to a hard landing if external financing for the deficit dries up; fears that have been magnified by the high ratio of speculative investment, or hot money, used to finance the current account gap, which could quickly flee Turkey if sentiment turns negative.

BCG isn’t the only economic research house warning that spiking oil could aggravate Turkey’s imbalances. Neil Shearing, emerging markets economist at Capital Economics calculates that every $10 rise in the price of oil would add $6 billion — or 12% of the 2010 total deficit — to the funding gap.

But Shearing also stresses that Turkey’s persistently strong economic data is suppressing market concern over the current account, sending stocks rising in recent weeks and pushing the Lira to a near-four month year high on Wednesday.

“Turkey’s one of the big losers from higher oil prices, and everyone knows (the current account) is a risk. Its like we’re waiting for a trigger — I thought the middle east turmoil would be that trigger but it hasn’t been yet,” he said.

Turkey’s policy makers may be hoping for a more benign outcome — where a steadily rising oil price eats into household incomes, gradually helping to rein in booming consumer spending and moderate the current account deficit.

via Oil Spike May Take a While to Punish Energy-Hungry Turkey – New Europe – WSJ.

April 8, 2011