What items are restricted or banned from importing and exporting in Turkey?

Every country has its own strategy of restricting or banning imports and exports in regards to its development policies, cultural values, and social, economic, and political priorities. However, there are certain items with even stricter export and import bans, like cultural and historical artifacts, illegal drugs, items threatening national security or societal health, and endemic plants and animals in some countries. Turkey is one of these countries implementing such foreign trade bans. For Turkey, these items include weapons, hazardous wastes, fertilizers, seeds, racing horses, veterinary drugs, flower bulbs, sugar, masks, and other health products. They require permission to be exported, and even after some legal restrictions still follow. There are also restrictions on imports to protect societal health and national security, and products damaging the ozone layer of the atmosphere are banned as well. 

Other than these general bans and restrictions, countries also utilize foreign trade strategies. They support select industries and impose restrictions on certain imports to gain the most from international trade. Turkey is a good example and has been receiving a large number of semi-finished products and machinery to improve industrial production. The Turkish government has given advantages to those importing machinery by placing relatively higher taxes on the imports of industrial products. However, the construction industry has been hit dramatically in the last couple of years, with the total debt amounting to almost USD 800 million. Thus, the government is now attempting to subsidize the industry and has placed no explicit ban or restriction on any product to protect the national sector.

Due to political reasons, the Turkish government implements foreign trade restrictions on products imported from certain countries, but none of these restrictions have been long-lasting. However, there are still some left on agricultural products like meat, grains, and cereals due to the deficit in international trade. In recent years, the production volume of the Turkish industries has decreased, even impacting trading, and the government has been working to diminish the deficit by imposing relatively higher taxes on imports. 

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