I am pleased to visit Islamabad on the occasion of the 13th Summit of the Organisation of Economic Co-operation Summit to be hosted by friendly and brotherly Pakistan.
The organisation that we established with Pakistan and Iran for the purpose of increasing our regional economic co-operation and development efforts and later expanded with the participation of other friendly and brotherly countries has always played an important role for the welfare, peace and future of our geography. ECO, bringing together 10 brotherly countries with the total population of 400 million in an area of 8 million square kilometres has inspired other regional organisations with its success.
The Islamabad Summit is being held at a time when critical developments and historic events at global and regional levels are experienced. We are going through a process in which the importance and weight of Eurasia on the political, trade and economic stages of the World are on the rise. As stated in the theme of the Summit, there is a close relationship between regional welfare and the connectivity of lines of transportation, communication and trade. I believe that the Organisation is a very valuable platform for turning our efforts in this aspect into co-ordinated and result-oriented actions.
Our countries have tremendous wealth in the areas of energy, industry, agriculture, mining, and tourism. The economies of the member states of the Organisation complement each other. We have a pool of young, educated and productive human resource. We should use all this wealth for the welfare of our people and the region by asserting our common interests. We need to benefit from the platform offered by the Organisation of Economic Co-operation Platform much better. We should make the ECO Secretariat to function more effectively and ensure that the Secretariat carries out its activities in a more productive manner. I hope that on the occasion of this Summit, necessary steps on these issues will be taken decisively.
Undoubtedly, we are aware that ECO is facing some challenges. We need to work hand in hand together, to overcome the problems of overspread of activities and loss of focus which make it quite difficult to develop and implement concrete projects. Our task for our region, peoples and friends who pin their hopes on us is to revitalise the Organisation by creating tangible success stories in priority areas. Despite the elapsed time since the establishment of ECO, intrarade volume among member states still occupies a small place in our general foreign trade figures. Activating the ECO-Trade Agreement ECOTA which is an important means for the liberalisation of the trade between us, as soon as possible and with as wide as possible participation, will be a serious step in this respect. When we look at the examples set by a few successful international organisations in the world today, we see that trade liberalisation among member countries plays a key role in their success. We know that some countries can be shy on this issue in order to protect their local industries from more developed economies, and we can understand this to a certain extent. However, we know that free competition, though causes some problems at the first stage, eventually strengthens the country's economy and makes it more efficient in the medium and long terms. We experienced this ourselves through the Customs Union which we established with the EU 20 years ago. I am, on this occasion, calling on brotherly countries that have not yet ratified the ECOTA to take steps in this regard.
Other factor impacting the development of trade relations is financing. In this respect, we have a relevant organisation, ECOBANK, activities of which are expanding rapidly. We should do whatever we need to further strengthen it.
We consider the ECO 2025 Vision Document that will be adopted by the Islamabad Summit as a road map for achieving these goals. Turkey, as it always has been, continues to do its part in order to increase the effectiveness of the Organisation and realise the Summit resolutions.
I know that all brotherly member states within ECO share almost similar views on these issues. The destiny of ECO is in our hands, the member states. In this respect, making ECO an important actor in our region and world depends on the decisions that we will take. I sincerely wish that the Islamabad Summit would serve as a historic turning point for ECO in this respect. We are grateful to Pakistan, Chairman of the Summit, for the efforts that it put forward for the success of the Summit and ECO.