Dear IKU Members,

As of June 2, 2020, every Tuesday and Thursday, with the Rectorate and certain administrative units; as of June 15, 2020, every day, we will start working with our specific academic and administrative units on our Ataköy campus within the framework of the pandemic measures.

Since the COVID-19 pandemic is not fully terminated, the risk remains until an effective virus-specific treatment and / or vaccine is found. During this period when the pandemic was controlled, a mask, visor equipments etc., will be given by our institution to our personnel who will continue their work on our Ataköy campus. It is also obligatory for our personnel to make an appointment by completing the Return to Work Examination Form after COVID19  and to have a physical examination at the date and time to be determined by the Directorate of Health, Culture and Sports.

Istanbul Kültür University (İKÜ) Head  of the Board of Trustees Bahar Akıngüç Günver published a message about the IKU agenda, which has changed with the new Corona Virus Disease (COVID-19).

My Dear Kültür Family,

As of June, the normal flow of everyday life as a country is slowly changing. In this period, in which the rules are bended gradually and in a controlled manner, we, as the Kültür Family, will return to our campuses for the first time  with the names determined from our administrative units after approximately 3 months. With the Rectorate Decision The names of our workmates who will work  from our administrative units between 1-14 June 2020 were shared by KOVKOM.

After a period of fear, anxiety, uncertainty, question marks, the return to normal is of course a new experience in itself. Within the scope of this work schedule, where we will also serve as the Board of Trustees, Rectorate and Secretariat offices, I would like to emphasize that all practices related to health and safety are carefully managed and followed. On this occasion, I would like to thank all my colleagues who will work in the gradual working system that will start in our campuses within the new normal and wish that the process will be the beginning of a healthy and productive period for all of us.

My Dear Workmates,

The first week of June is an extremely important date for our students and academic staff. I wish success to our academic staff and students who will experience an intensive study period with the finals.

In the spring semester, as in our course and exam applications, our summer education will be realized by distance education due to the pandemic. Our Summer School, which will be registered between 25-30 June 2020, will start on July 1, 2020 through CATS V3, our distance education management system developed with new technologies. I wish that the distance summer education, which will be a different experience for all of us, will be successful for our academicians and students.

As a university, another of our agenda items is the fall semester. Our priority is, of course, the COVID-19 in the fall semester of the 2020-2021 academic year, which we consider through various scenarios. Our main goal is to make our campuses ready for the fall semester in the safest and healthiest way for our students and employees during the recovery period of pandemic and to realize our academic mission. In this context, my workmates from different teams; and our institution's belief in 60 years of education management and values ​​has an important place in developing new skill sets, making goal oriented plans and adapting to the new norm quickly. In this challenging process, I would like to thank all my workmates who have contributed.

My dear workfriends,

In the process, there are very beautiful and promising developments in the name of culture, art and life in our university. Our İKÜ Publishing House is excited to bring readers of the Renaissance Art: A Very Short Beginner book as the 8th book of the Oxford Publications. Foreword to the Turkish edition of the book is art historian and curator. It came out of Necmi Sönmez's pen. Our Fine Arts Application and Research Center is in the preparation of a new process under the name İKÜSANAT. Despite everything, without giving time and space, we hope to continue to plan and produce new ideas, formations to spread art to every layer of life. Recently, we had a 1000-person digital class. We used this class for the first time on a very meaningful date such as 19 May Atatürk Remembrance, Youth and Sports Day. I hope that this new area, which we have opened on the digital ground of our university, will be the scene of many artistic and cultural creative events that we can realize in the digital world, inspired by both the candidate communication period and our Akıngüç Auditorium and Gallery.

Dear Culture Family,

Let's continue to keep our hope and horizon clear. Let's continue to produce, think, and trust each other. Mutual understanding and sacrifice will be our greatest need in the recovery period.

We hope that June will be the beginning of a healthy, happy new period...

With my compliments

Dr. Bahar Akıngüç Günver

Chairman of IKU Board of Trustees

Foreign exchange reserves at the Central Bank of the Republic of Turkey were seeing the historic summit in 2013 with the largest reserves scored a record 115.1 billion dollars. At the end of last year, these reserves amounted to $ 81.2 billion. On 15 May this year, the Central Bank announced its total foreign currency reserves as 84.4 and gross foreign currency reserves as $ 48.8 billion. 35.5 billion dollars of this constitutes gold reserves. Thus, the foreign exchange reserves of the Central Bank decreased by $ 2.3 billion. DTHs increased by $ 1.4 billion compared to last week and reached $ 195.7 billion. When we look at the numbers above; It was the wish of foreign currency reserves to be at least 130 billion dollars by basing the old record of our country.

In the official newspaper dated 24.05.2020 and numbered 31136, in the Presidential Decree No. 2568, the ratio of BITT was increased to 5 (five) times in foreign exchange purchases.

The foreign exchange tax, which was 0.2% (two per thousand), increased to 1% (one percent). We will get 1 for 100 dollars for ourselves and 10 for 1000 dollars for the state. We can also call it a capital control instrument. This situation will stay away from solving the problems in the long term and will only save the day.

These two issues I mentioned above; 18.04.22020 and 20.05.22020 between the decrees published with the existing customs tax rates of some of the imported items increase and again some imported items in a temporary period of additional customs duties (IGV) have been brought.

The first effect of this is to increase customs duties on imports of existing products or to increase costs, whether raw materials or final products, by imposing additional customs duties. Domestic firms will also increase the prices of their products in return for these tax rates. These price increases will also be one of the reasons for rising inflation. These price increases will be reflected in the final consumers who receive these products. In this case, they will need an instrument for the import of imported raw materials which they use as inputs in manufacturing. This inward processing regime will benefit from the import tax and tax types will occur during the whole of the conditional exemption within the scope of exemption and excused will be to perform the export. The most important problem here is the difficulties experienced in accessing financing in letter of guarantee or in cash and the high financing costs when creating the guarantee that manufacturers and Manufacturers-Exporters give to the customs authorities as collateral on imports. Since we are more than 80% dependent abroad on crude matter and especially on petroleum-petroleum derivatives, which are the most important items, we have to import these raw materials, which are inputs of export products.

This is the raw material I mentioned above. So, “what's the deal with investment property?"if we say. Investors who have investment incentive certificate are exempt from customs duty on imports of machinery and equipment, while they are not exempt from additional customs duty. This in turn seriously scares the domestic and foreign capital that will make new complete investments or interpretation investments. It is said that companies with machinery and equipment at customs accrue three times the penalty of additional customs duty. Additional customs duties are not a customs duty. Companies that do not pay customs duty on machinery and equipment they import within the scope of investment incentive certificate have subsequently started to receive penalties as additional customs duties. As a result of the evaluation of these objections made between the Ministry of Commerce and the Ministry of Industry and technology, the final decision was in the form of payment of these additional customs duties. The reason for the exemption from customs duties on certified investments and the exception from VAT, other tax advantages were evaluated as not providing. In order to ensure that it is outside the scope of this, legal arrangements should be made as soon as possible and additional customs duties should be included in the scope of exemption, such as customs duties, especially in order to keep foreign capital from breaking away from our country. At the moment, we need the direct investment of foreign capital at the macro level as the country's economy.

In fact, I will write in the next lines of additional customs taxes, while describing the aims and tools used by countries in forming their foreign trade policies. For now, the companies that produce due to additional customs duties give up imports of raw materials and final products due to the increase in costs, and the domestic capital creates the opportunity to meet the demands by going to produce them. Thus, foreign exchange deficit will decrease positively by not going abroad. Here, domestic and national production will come into play. But how native and national will it be?

If we look at the academic dimension of this business, the different geographical structure, climate, underground-above-ground resources, geopolitical and socio-economic status of the countries while forming foreign trade policies cause foreign trade. Countries that are dependent on foreign materials, especially raw materials, must absolutely import for production. While establishing foreign trade policies, ie general economic policies, they also determine the objectives and tools of the policies. We can count these goals as eliminating foreign payment imbalances, protecting from foreign competition, economic development, liberalizing the economy, ensuring internal economic stability, eliminating market failures, generating income for the treasury, social and political reasons, autarchy, utilizing monopoly power in foreign markets and foreign policy objectives. If we say what tools we use to achieve these goals, we can list them as customs tariffs, non-tariff barriers, export promotion and affiliated trade.

The prominent aim in the current foreign trade policy is to generate income for the treasury. As a vehicle, we can evaluate the customs tariffs as additional customs duties, reducing imports and increasing the foreign exchange position of the central bank by strengthening the foreign currency position.

Here we also need to consider the evaluations of the two economists. These are Adam Smith's “Theory of Absolute Superiority” and David Ricardo's “Comparative Superiority”. According to Ricardo, “Absolute Advantages Theory” is a special case of “Comparative Advantages Theory”. Where comparative advantage takes place, there is already absolute advantage.

Cem Özvarlar

IKU Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences

Department of International Trade

 Lecturer

Within the scope of the New Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) epidemic, the Ministry of Health has published a guide on the measures to be taken regarding personnel service vehicles. It was stated in the guide that due to the formation of droplets, it should not be spoken in the service, and drinks and food, including water, should not be used.

It was pointed out in the guide, which was added to the “Guide for Outbreak Management and Working in the Community” as the 28th item, that services are characteristic for the spread of the COVID-19 outbreak because they are public transportation vehicles.

It was stated in the guide that the service drivers should be informed about the epidemic by the employer, the rules that should be obeyed about the epidemic should be hanged in the vehicle in a visible way and a hand antiseptic should be placed next to the entrance door in the vehicles.

Definite cases: Turkey (163,942), World (6,057,853)

Death:             Turkey (4,540), World (371,166)

WHO Risk Assessment: Global level - Very High