Turkish Finance Minister Mehmet Simsek said Friday that Turkey aims to cut its current account deficit to a reasonable level in the medium to long term.
Speaking to reporters, Simsek said there is no concern about financing the widening current account deficit and that reducing the deficit to zero isn’t on the government’s agenda.
Turkey’s current account posted a deficit of $4.361 billion in April this year, compared with a deficit of $1.583 billion in the corresponding month of 2009, the country’s central bank earlier said Friday.
In the first four months of 2010, the current account deficit widened to $14.251 billion from a deficit of $3.562 billion in the comparable period of 2009.
Simsek said Turkey’s economy may grow by between 10% and 14% in the first quarter of this year, but warned that double-digit growth in the second quarter was a low probability.
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Thursday that Turkey’s economy is expected to grow between 6% and 7% in 2010.
The International Monetary Fund expects Turkey’s gross domestic product to rise by 6.25% in 2010.
Turkish GDP rose 6% on the year in the fourth quarter, after a 2.9% contraction in the third quarter, the most recent figures show. GDP contracted 4.7% in 2009 as a whole.
In April, Turkish Economy Minister Ali Babacan said that the government in June was likely to revise its forecast for 2010 economic growth higher. It currently predicts a 3.5% expansion.