On the way back to the country from a meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization’s Council of Heads of State and Observers in Dushanbe, Tajikistan, Mr. S.Amarsaikhan, the Deputy Prime Minister of Mongolia met with leaders and officials of Desbas Free Zone in Istanbul, Turkey and exchanged views on intensifying cooperation on September 19, 2021.
In January 2021, a Memorandum of Understanding was signed between the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister of Mongolia and the Ministry of Commerce of Turkey on cooperation in the free zone sector. In this context, Deputy Prime Minister S.Amarsaikhan talked to Hakan Ceylan, Director General of the Desbas Free Zone, about the public-private partnership management model of Turkey, tax incentives for companies operating in the free zone, and service tariffs and openly exchanged views on how to increase bilateral trade and investment and seek opportunities for mutually beneficial cooperation based on cross-border free zones such as Zamiin-Uud and Altanbulag of Mongolia and learn from Turkey’s experience which has a lot of experience in the field of free zone in intensifying the activities of these free zone.
Mr.Ali Bayaraktar, Director of the Free Zone Authorities under the Turkish Ministry of Commerce attended the meeting and gave brief information on the government’s free zone policy and how it issues licenses to enterprises. There are currently 18 free zones in Turkey, of which three are based in Istanbul. The Desbas Free Zone was established in 1993-1995 and has been in operation since 1995. It transferred to the private sector through management privatization in 2008. About 300 companies are currently operating in the free zone and have created about 6,000 jobs and 2-3$ billion dollars worth of trade and services are circulating in the free zone.
