71,500 merchants closed their doors in 8 months

While the increase in prices, from needle to thread, continues to reduce the purchasing power of citizens every day, merchants who are forced to close their businesses without work are also having a hard time.

Traders, whose input costs, such as electricity and workplace rent, increase by 100 percent every year, find the solution to get out of the economic difficulties they are going through by closing their workplaces.

CHP Manisa Deputy Bekir Başevirgen made a statement based on data from the Confederation of Turkish Traders and Craftsmen (TESK), stating that the number of traders who closed their businesses last year increased by 20 percent in the first 8 months of this year. .

’71 THOUSAND 500 TRADERS ARE IN BANKRUPTCY’

Sharing TESK data, CHP Manisa Deputy Başevirgen stated that the number of merchants who close their dandruff increases every year due to the economic bottleneck and that the effect of the economic crisis is worsening.

CHP’s Başevirgen made the following statements in his statement:

“The deep economic depression began to worsen day by day. According to TESK data, while 59,900 merchants closed their doors in the first 8 months of 2022, this figure increased by 20 percent in the first 8 months of 2023, reaching 71,500. Our merchants, whose input costs have increased and who cannot escape the debt trap, now find the last resort to close their businesses. Because citizens do not have purchasing power. “Merchants close their businesses without leaving a trace.”

‘330 THOUSAND SMEs ARE BEING FOLLOWED’

Başevirgen stated that the debts of SMEs to the banking sector, which have not been able to alleviate the debt burden they have borne since the pandemic period, increased to 2 trillion 868 billion lira in July, Başevirgen said: “The expenses are no longer convertible. The number of SMEs was 4 million 588 thousand in April. “The number of SMEs whose debts are under monitoring has reached 330,000,” he said.

‘THE TRADERS ARE COMPLETELY SOLD OUT’

In the last part of his statement, CHP’s Başevirgen concluded his words with the following statements, underlining that the increase in the number of closed merchants has reached alarming levels:

“High interest rates, high exchange rates, exorbitant tax and price increases, uncontrolled workplace rents and business expenses multiplied by electricity and natural gas bills force merchants to close their shutters . Our small merchants and artisans are exhausted. Cost increases leave merchants in a difficult situation and cause them to lose more than just profits. Taking into account the drop in citizens’ purchasing power, neither vacations, wedding and holiday seasons, nor the opening of schools improved the business of merchants. While merchants disappear, the army of unemployed grows like an avalanche. “In this situation where the government is just watching, unfortunately the increase in mass bankruptcies will be inevitable, taking into account the debt burden and the increasing costs of companies.”