President Recep Tayip Erdoğan arrived Saturday at Istanbul New Airport to attend Turkey's first aerospace and technology festival Teknofest.
"In today's world, the first condition of real freedom, independence and development is to design, produce and export technology," Erdoğan said.
By providing competition teams with technical equipment and support to design and develop their own projects, the event aims at supporting young innovators' technological developments.
"Turkey will not be able to ensure its security in all areas until it produces its own technologies," Erdoğan said.
Turkey is using 65 percent of indigenous products in the defense industry, the president added.
"In the field of technology you cannot just consume, you have to produce," he said.
Teknofest Istanbul is being organized by the Turkey Technology Team Foundation (T3) and the Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality to promote and to showcase Turkey's rapid advance in technology on September 20-23 at the city's new airport.
Nearly 80,000 people registered for the festival.
The festival kicked off on Thursday and features air shows, aviation demonstrations, technology competitions, seminars on cutting-edge technology, and an international entrepreneurship summit, along with other activities.
As part of the festival, the leading Turkish defense and technology institutions and corporations such as Aselsan, Baykar, IGA, Isbak, Roketsan, TAI, Turkish Airlines, TUBITAK and TURKSAT will organized competitions in 12 different categories.
