Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic visited Kraljevo on Sunday where Turkish textile company, Eurotay is building a production plant that will employ 2,500 people.
Also in attendance were Chairman of the Turkish Tai Group, Mesut Toprak (Eurotay is a member of the Tai Group), Serbian Minister of Trade Rasim Ljajic, the Ambassador of Turkey to Serbia, Tanju Bilgic, and the Mayor of Kraljevo, Predrag Terzic.
Toprak thanked Vucic for visiting the factory and said that the factory in Kraljevo would span 30,000 square meters and employ 2,500 workers.
“Serbia will occupy an important position in the and clothing segment, and our aim is for the value of our exports from Serbia to reach 90 million euro,” Toprak said.
He added that the plan was for the factory to be built by March and put into operation by April 2019.
He says that the construction of the factory will be completed in March, which will start production in April.
The plant will, as he said, produce seven million pairs of jeans annually.
“The factory will have state-of-the-art technology incorporated into a facility that will merge all production processes”, Toprak said, adding that the company has been enjoying a great support from the authorities in Serbia, as well as from the people of Kraljevo.
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Toprak pointed out that around 10,000 people would benefit from the Kraljevo factory – both employees and their families.
Tai Group was founded in 1977 in Istanbul, and today it is one of the biggest textile companies in that segment.
Tai Group’s CEO went on to say that the Group has forged strategic partnerships with many world brands, and that outside of Turkey, they also made investments in Egypt, Algeria and now Serbia.
“We produce eight million pairs of jeans a year in Turkey and six million in Egypt. We have more than 10,000 employees in Turkey, Egypt and Algeria,” added Toprak.
Serbian President, Aleksandar Vucic said that a lot of effort had been invested to make the Turkish investment reality, and added that he expected the Turkish President, Rejep Tayyip Erdogan to attend the official opening of the factory once is finished, in early spring next year.
Vucic also expressed his expectation that Serbia would have even more investors from Turkey, as well as tourists. In his speech, he also pointed out that Tai Group’s investment was valued at 35 million EUR.
Serbian Minister of Trade, Rasim Ljajic underlined that the factory was the result of the good economic relations between Serbia and Turkey, thanks to Vucic’s personal relations with Turkish President Rexhep Tayyip Erdogan.
Ljajic also pointed out that good political relations between the two countries have paved the way for Turkish companies coming to Serbia and added that all of them intended to expand production in our country, which was a validation that Serbia had a good business environment.
The Ambassador of Turkey said he was very happy about the Turkish investment in Kraljevo, adding that that was one of the biggest investments that Turkey had ever made in Serbia.
According to him, Turkey has made close to 200 million euro investments in Serbia so far, and the goal was for the external trade between the two countries to reach 1 billion euro.
Textile factory Eurotay, which is being built in the village of Adrani near Kraljevo, will employ a total of 2,500 people.
As announced, the opening day is set for April 2019 and the company has already trained 115 local workers for the work in the factory.
In the first phase, the factory will employ between 400 and 700 workers, and by 2023, a total of 2,500.
Turkish textile company Tai Group bought the property of Kraljevo-based Autotransport, which had declared bankruptcy, for 260 million dinars in order to build the factory.
The investment is stipulated in the agreement signed by the President of Serbia and his Turkish counterpart.
A Turkish investor has announced that it will also open a nursery for the children of their workers.
(RTV, 21.10.2018)
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