According to the provisional foreign trade statistics compiled by the Turkish Statistical Institute (TUIK) and the Turkish Undersecretariat of Customs, in February this year Turkey's foreign trade deficit increased by 15 percent to $3.69 billion compared to February 2016. In the first two months of this year, Turkey's foreign trade deficit rose by 12.7 percent year on year to $8.02 billion.
In February, Turkey's iron and steel exports ranked fourth among the country's products with the highest export value, totaling $741.17 million, increasing by 57.7 percent year on year. Meanwhile, in the given month the value of exports of articles of iron or steel, which ranked 10th among the products with the highest export value, decreased by 2.6 percent year on year, amounting to $403.59 million.
In the January-February period of this year, Turkey's iron and steel export value increased by 51.8 percent to $1.34 billion, while the value of its exports of articles of iron or steel rose by 3.8 percent to $803.06 million, both year on year.