According to the provisional foreign trade statistics compiled by the Turkish Statistical Institute (TUIK) and the Turkish Undersecretariat of Customs, in December last year Turkey's foreign trade deficit decreased by 71.1 percent to $2.68 billion compared to December 2017. In 2018, Turkey's foreign trade deficit fell by 28.4 percent year on year to $55 billion.
In December, Turkey's iron and steel exports ranked third among the country's products with the highest export value, totaling $1.12 billion, increasing by 35.6 percent year on year. Meanwhile, in the given month the value of exports of articles of iron or steel, which ranked sixth among the products with the highest export value, increased by 4.8 percent year on year, amounting to $545.24 million.
In 2018, Turkey's iron and steel export value increased by 40.6 percent to $11.58 billion, while the value of its exports of articles of iron or steel rose by 16.9 percent to $6.55 billion, both year on year.