The European Investment Bank (EIB), the European Union (EU)'s long-term financing institution, is providing a loan of €150 million ($151.4 million) to Toyota Otomotiv Sanayi Turkiye A.Ş. The loan will fund the modernization of an existing vehicle manufacturing plant in Adapazarı in the Eastern Marmara region, some 120 kilometers east of Istanbul.
The investment will increase the plant’s capacity to accommodate the production of selected models of the new Toyota Corolla model family. The project will provide an important, economic impulse to the eastern Marmara region of Turkey, which has not yet recovered from the economic effects of the earthquake of August 1999.
The project will directly create new jobs with the number of employees expected to double from about 1,150 last year to nearly 2,500 by the year 2005 in the plant itself. In addition, it can be expected that for each new job another indirect job will be created at suppliers and related services. Once operational in 2004, the project would contribute between €1.1-1.4 billion per year to the country’s domestic product. As some of these local suppliers are subsidiaries of EU and Japanese company’s, this results in additional employment and foreign direct investments.
This is the first EIB loan in Turkey under the Pre-Accession Facility, following Turkey’s inclusion into the list of eligible countries under the Facility by the Council of Governors in April 2001. As a major private sector operation, the project is also fully in-line with the Euro-Mediterranean Investment Partnership Facility (FEMIP), reflecting the recent decisions of the European Council of Barcelona to provide financial assistance to the private sector’s efforts in the Mediterranean region. — (menareport.com)
© 2002 Mena Report (www.menareport.com)
