Reviewing Agricultural Trade Policies
To Promote Intra-OIC Agricultural Trade
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is the Union of Chambers and Commodity Exchanges (TOBB), a key market institution that
publishes daily prices of standardized agricultural goods at its website by using the data from
the regional commodity exchanges. The second one is Agricultural Credit Cooperatives of
Turkey which supplies credits to nearly 1 million agricultural producers through its large
network of 17 regional unions and 1,625 cooperatives.
The key informants that were interviewed in Turkey were from Ministry of Agriculture and
Forestry, Ministry of Trade, Agricultural Credit Cooperatives of Turkey, Tareks Co. Ltd., OIC
SESRIC, and the Turkish Exporters' Assembly. The list of the key informants is presented in
Annex D.
The key informant interview includes 9 questions (Annex C). The questions are related with (i)
agricultural trade policies, with a particular focus on objectives, tools, and institutions, (ii)
policies on issues such as food security, supply chains, and smallholder farmers, and (iii) major
trading partners and key agricultural trade products, with a particular focus on existing and
potential trade relationships with fellow OIC countries.
Agricultural trade policies
The summary presented in this subsection is focused on selected facts, issues and notions
emerging from the key informant interviews.
Agricultural trade and support policies are not only focused on production volumes and farmers’
welfare but also on sustainability, consumer protection and rural development. Therefore, the
typical support programs of the past such as price supports, support purchases, tariffs and
quotas are increasingly replaced by non-market support mechanisms. Besides, as in the case of
non-agricultural products, it is of crucial importance to enter new global value chains in
agriculture.
The overall policy environment in Turkish agricultural trade is liberal, but Turkey practices
some strategic actions with regards to tariff protection as long as it is not against the WTO
commitments. Regarding the NTMs, export subsidies and SPS measures are most commonly
exercised NTMs in Turkey as underlined above.
The main policy objectives behind the SPS measures are related with public health issues. From
the export side, the most widely used form of agricultural trade policy instruments are export
subsidies in Turkey. The primary purpose of using such a policy tool is for sustained production
and export of agricultural commodities.
Small and fragmented farms, inefficient value chains, difficulties in access to finance, and
institutional and regulatory inefficiencies are the major constraints that limit the role of
agricultural trade on overall development. Trading costs, difficulties in access to market
information, standardization and quality issues, and NTMs, including the SPS measures, are
among other trade-related constraints.
Food security, supply chains, and smallholder farmers
Agricultural supply chains involve different stages, ranging from production, processing,
product delivery, and final consumption. The Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry is responsible
for policy implementation and provides support programs. The supports also reach out to
eligible young farmers and companies. There exists agricultural and food subsidies and grants
distributed by the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry for the production and processing of
agricultural products and rural development. Banks, NGOs, regional development agencies, and
chambers of agriculture are key stakeholders in the distribution of the supports.