As Feb. 28 draws near, the day when the Turkish Statistical Institute (TÜİK) will announce Turkey’s 2021 gross domestic product (GDP) data and growth rate, the calculations and estimates continue to be made. My estimations based on industrial production and export data representing the whole of 2021 so far show that the Turkish economy achieved a growth rate between 11.3% and 11.02% in 2021. My forecast for the fourth quarter growth rate, which will be announced on the same day, is between 8.07% and 7.36%, with a probability of 70%.

My forecast for the weighted annual growth is 11.2% for 2021. That shows Turkey completed the year with one of the highest growth rates among the world's 45 leading countries and Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) member countries, together with Ireland, and with the highest growth rate among the G-20 countries. My most optimistic forecast for the fourth-quarter GDP growth rate is 8.5%; my most pessimistic estimate is 6.65%. In light of these data and forecasts, despite the after-shocks of coronavirus, Turkey completed 2021 with a very high growth rate, in which many countries suffered to recover, proves how dynamic Turkey's production capacity and production is capabilities are.

Let's look at what level Turkey's GDP may have reached in 2021 in terms of the Turkish lira and the United States dollar. In line with my "new" real growth rate estimate for 2021, which I revised to 11.2%, I can state that my new estimate for Turkey's 2021 nominal GDP is TL 7.6 trillion, which is $856.5 billion.

Global trade is $29 trillion in 2022

Due to the intensified efforts of the leading countries and leaders of the world economy to eliminate all the adverse effects of the global pandemic, the global trade volume, which closed the year with a very ambitious increase rate of 25.3% in 2021, the estimates for the 2022 increase, are very conservative between 3.8% and 4.4%. In this case, the global trade, which reached a volume of $28 trillion in 2021, will most likely attain the $1 trillion increase projected for 2022 with the increase in the global services trade. Because, although it recovered well in 2021, the global services trade is still below 2019 levels.

Compared to a 25.3% increase in global goods trade, the global services trade was able to increase by 14.4% in 2021. As for 2022, the global and regional political tensions, the pressure caused by global energy prices, the rise in global inflation forcing the world's leading central banks to increase interest rates, problems in the global supply chain and the disruptions caused by new coronavirus variants, the high freight, loading, port and logistics costs and the prolonged loading and unloading, are all risks that will seriously impact the global trade this year.

The global goods trade, which reached its highest level in history with $22 trillion in 2021, maintains this record level in 2022. The global services trade reached $6 trillion in 2021 and is likely to reach $7 trillion in 2022. This will also bring global trade to $29 trillion. If global goods trade reaches $23 billion with a new record, we can even see $30 trillion in global trade for the first time.