Questioning Turkey’s “Miracle” Growth From a Sustainability Perspective

Abstract

Over the last two decades, Turkey has enjoyed high rates of economic growth. This study uses “the adjusted net saving” approach to explore to what extent Turkey achieved this growth at the expense of rapid natural resource use and increased environmental pollution in violation of basic sustainability criteria. We examine the components of adjusted net savings (i.e., changes in physical, natural, and human capital) for the period 1970 to 2011 and consider the sectoral shifts resulting from capital investments and accompanying state policies that are driving industrialization in Turkey. We find that the so-called miracle growth in the 2000s has come at the expense of massive natural capital utilization. Although gross fixed capital formation has continued to grow, it has been accompanied by high depreciation, and thus, in the post-2000 period, the net accumulation of physical capital has followed a declining trend.