Turkey Construction Costs Up 28.33% — September 2026 Bulletin

İTOSAM — Weekly Economic Bulletin | 11 September 2026

Translation of the Istanbul Chamber of Commerce economic bulletin

İTO Centre for Strategic Research — developments of 7 to 11 September 2026

Covered: McKinsey's 2026 AI outlook, foreign trade by enterprise size and by main activity, ICT usage in enterprises, the Medium-Term Programme, the Monetary Policy Committee decision, the balance of payments, turnover indices, real returns on financial instruments, the trade sales volume index and the construction cost index

1. McKinsey: 2026 AI Outlook

"AI adoption is spreading, but financial returns are not growing at the same pace"

McKinsey & Company's report 2026 AI Outlook: Toward Return on Investment shows that AI is moving from the pilot stage toward enterprise-scale use. The global survey was conducted in May and June 2026 with 1,719 respondents. 89% say their organisation uses AI regularly in at least one business function, and the share reporting AI scaled across the whole organisation rose from 38% to 44% in one year.

Large firms lead in autonomous AI agents: among companies with revenue above USD 1 billion, the share scaling agents rose from 27% to 40%, while for smaller firms it stayed at 22%. A further 32% said they cancelled at least one software purchase because AI coding tools let them build the feature in-house.

The report also records a gap between employee gains and financial results. 80% report higher personal productivity and 50% report better decision-making, yet only 37% report a positive contribution to operating profit — unchanged from last year. Even so, 60% expect AI investment to increase over the next year.

2. Foreign trade by enterprise size — 2025

"Large enterprises accounted for 46.1% of exports and 59.4% of imports"

According to 2025 foreign trade data, 166,459 enterprises exported and 323,769 enterprises imported.

On the export side, micro enterprises of 1 to 9 employees generated 18.3% of total exports while making up 74.2% of all exporters. Small enterprises of 10 to 49 employees held 17.3%, medium enterprises of 50 to 249 held 18.3%, and large enterprises of 250 or more held 46.1%.

On the import side, micro enterprises generated 10.7% of total imports, small enterprises 11.9%, medium enterprises 18.0%, and large enterprises 59.4% — while large importers are only 1.1% of all importing enterprises.

3. Foreign trade by main activity — 2025

"Industrial enterprises carried out 57.6% of exports"

By main activity, 57.6% of exports and 45.4% of imports were carried out by enterprises operating in industry. Enterprises whose main activity is trade held 37.7% of exports and 37.8% of imports.

In industrial exports, large enterprises of 250 or more employees led with 70.3%. In trade-sector exports, small and medium enterprises of 1 to 249 employees kept the lead with 89.0%. In industrial imports, large enterprises led with 80.7%. Large enterprises held 29.8% in the trade sector and 68.6% in other sectors.

4. ICT usage in enterprises — 2026

"Share of enterprises making e-sales: 17.1%"

In 2026, 92.7% of enterprises with 10 or more employees used a fixed-line connection for internet access. The share using social media rose from 55.2% in 2025 to 57.7% in 2026 — 55.0% among firms with 10 to 49 employees, 68.4% for those with 50 to 249, and 86.6% for those with 250 or more.

The share of enterprises selling via the internet or Electronic Data Interchange rose from 13.6% in 2024 to 17.1% in 2025. E-sales are most common in accommodation and food services at 43.3%, followed by publishing, broadcasting and content activities at 25.4% and wholesale and retail trade at 23.7%.

5. Medium-Term Programme — 2027 to 2029

"Downward revision to growth in the Medium-Term Programme"

The Presidency of Strategy and Budget published the Medium-Term Programme, the three-year roadmap of the economy, covering 2027 to 2029.

Growth is targeted at 4.2% in 2027, 4.6% in 2028 and 5% in 2029. The 2027 and 2028 targets were revised down by 0.1 and 0.4 points against the previous programme.

Unemployment is expected to fall to 8% in 2027, 7.8% in 2028 and 7.6% in 2029. The 2027 target was lowered by 0.2 points and the 2028 target was left unchanged.

Year-end consumer inflation is targeted at 21% in 2027, 13.5% in 2028 and single digits at 9% in 2029. The 2027 and 2028 targets were revised up by 12 and 5.5 points.

6. Monetary Policy Committee decision

"The Central Bank kept the policy rate unchanged"

The Monetary Policy Committee of the Central Bank of the Republic of Türkiye kept the policy rate — the one-week repo auction rate — unchanged at 37%. The overnight lending rate was kept at 40% and the overnight borrowing rate at 35.5%.

Key points of the decision text: signs of decline in the underlying trend of inflation were among the main factors supporting keeping rates at the current level; weak domestic demand and the limited pass-through of supply shocks to prices indicated that demand-driven inflationary pressure has eased; and upside risks to inflation persist due to high energy prices and geopolitical risks, so the Central Bank maintained its tight and cautious policy stance.

7. Balance of payments — July 2026

"In July the current account posted a USD 36 million surplus"

According to the Central Bank Balance of Payments Report, the current account recorded a surplus of USD 36 million in July 2026. Excluding gold and energy, the current account posted a USD 5.0 billion surplus; on an annualised basis, the 12-month cumulative current account deficit stood at USD 40.7 billion.

The balance-of-payments defined foreign trade deficit was USD 5.6 billion in July, with goods exports of USD 25.2 billion and goods imports of USD 30.8 billion. The services balance provided a net inflow of USD 8.2 billion, driven by travel and transport, and the annualised services surplus reached USD 63.5 billion.

On the financing side, portfolio investment recorded a net inflow of USD 5.8 billion, while banks and other sectors used net credit of USD 1.7 billion and USD 2.0 billion respectively. Official reserves rose by a net USD 14.3 billion, and net errors and omissions were an inflow of USD 620 million.

8. Turnover indices — July 2026

"Total turnover up 30.2% year-on-year"

The total turnover index — covering industry, construction, trade and services — rose 30.2% in July compared with the same month of the previous year. By sector, annual increases were 31.5% in industry, 35.8% in construction, 27.7% in trade and 34.5% in services.

On a monthly basis in July, the industry turnover index rose 3.0%, construction 9.2% and services 2.5%, while the trade turnover index remained unchanged.

9. Real returns on financial instruments — August 2026

"Gold bullion gave the highest real return, monthly and annually"

TÜİK published real return rates of financial investment instruments for August. The highest monthly real return came from gold bullion at 7.93%. The US dollar and the BİST 100 index lost value for investors. Over twelve months, gold bullion again delivered the highest real return at 16.49%, followed by government debt securities at 1.39% and gross deposit interest at 0.56%.

10. Trade sales volume index — July 2026

"Trade sales volume down 0.6% year-on-year"

The trade sales volume index fell 2.5% in July compared with the previous month and 0.6% compared with the same month a year earlier.

By sub-item and month on month, sales volume in wholesale and retail trade and repair of motor vehicles and motorcycles fell 9.8% and wholesale trade sales volume fell 4.2%, while retail trade sales volume rose 10.4%.

The trade sales volume index measures, on a monthly basis, the sales volumes of enterprises of different types and sizes operating in the trade sector.

11. Construction cost index — July 2026

"Annual increase in construction costs: 28.33%"

The construction cost index rose 1.15% month on month and 28.33% year on year in July 2026. By sub-item, the materials index rose 1.28% and the labour index 0.92% on a monthly basis; annually, materials rose 27.13% and labour 30.51%.

For buildings, the construction cost index rose 1.08% monthly and 28.37% annually, with annual changes of 27.34% for materials and 30.19% for labour. For civil engineering works, the index rose 1.38% monthly and 28.19% annually, with materials up 26.50% and labour up 31.65% over the year.

This document is a translation of the İTO Centre for Strategic Research (İTOSAM) weekly economic bulletin dated 11 September 2026. Data is drawn from the sources cited in the bulletin (McKinsey, TÜİK, SBB, TCMB).