Turkey's CUR still maintains strong status

Turkey’s CUR still maintains strong status

Turkey's capacity utilization rate (CUR) in the manufacturing industry was recorded as 84.1% in July, according to the State Institute of Statistics (DIE) data. The figure is slightly below the June figure of 84.3% and well above the 79.8% recorded in July 2003. The high CUR indicates that the high growth pace registered in the first and second quarter will also continue in the third quarter. Moreover, this figure signals that manufacturing sector will increase its investment spending largely in the coming months. The public sector CUR reached 89.9% in July due to the strong refining output in summer months. Private sector CUR was recorded as 80.8%, indicating as the main driving factor of the increase in the overall CUR. According to sub-sectors, in July, the highest CUR was registered in coke and refined petroleum products sector with 94.1% because of the increase in TUPRAS' petroleum products output. On the other hand, many sectors have showed signs of a slowdown in CUR; food, textile, apparel, chemicals and iron and steel have all shown CUR rates below the level of the last year.