Turkey’s textile industry is looking for greener pastures outside its traditional radar.
The situation in Turkey’s neighborhood -- Syria, Iraq, Lebanon but, partly, also in Russia – has impacted Turkish textile exports.

So the country is looking at the markets of Asia, Western Europe and North America, which have a large middle-class consumer base.

As Turkey’s textile exports grow, the country’s textile manufacturing companies will have to upgrade their machinery, parts and components, as well as the manufacturing processes.

Turkey’s textile exports surged in 2017. The overall textile products category, which includes not only home and technical textiles but also fabrics and garments, touched a whopping 157 billion dollars in total exports; home textiles exports alone amounted to 2.7 billion dollars in 2017, while garment exports amounted to 17 billion dollars in the same year.

The aim is to reach 500 billion dollars by the year 2023.

Turkish textile companies are also being encouraged to consider technical collaboration with foreign partners. For instance Turkish upholstery manufacturers are being urged to work with furniture suppliers from Malaysia and Indonesia.

Bursa, the country’s textile hub, is planning to set up an ambitious 4.0 industrial production zone called Teknosab on a 8,500 acre land and deploying robots and automation.