In 2009, the world entered a new financial era. The ongoing global economic crisis has affected all developing and developed countries. During this period, the crisis turned into a complete economic crisis affecting not only financial circles but also the real sector. This chapter evaluates the impact of the global crisis upon the export performance of the Turkish ceramics sector. To this end, this study seeks to measure the export performance of the ceramics factories, ranked among the largest 1,000 industrial firms in 2009, and to offer some recommendations for improvement in the industrial production. Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) is used in the identification of the effectiveness in the exports by ceramics companies. The study, which relies on eight firms as decision units is comprised of three inputs (net actives, number of workers, and amount of production) and one output (export). The study, based on output-oriented DEA, finds that only Vitra was effective and efficient in its exports in 2009. Based on these findings, it could be concluded that the only company that has not been affected by the global crisis was Vitra.
TopIntroduction
In simplest form, ceramic means earth cooked on extremely high temperature. Ceramic products are mainly classified into four categories: covering materials (tiles), health equipment, adornments, technical ceramics (porcelain isolators, advanced technology ceramics, etc.) (Sezer, 1994, p. 1).
The sector has started becoming industrialized since 1960s. The sector has grown fast owing to the advancements in construction sector and the spread of use of ceramics to have a greater share in particularly developing countries (Bozdoğan, 2003, p. 118).
Since 1980s, developed European countries and the US, as well as the developing countries started to create their own ceramic industries by using the opportunities to become closer to raw materials, transport the final products and have access to technology. A number of developed countries moved their production activities to developing countries because of labor costs and production expenses; in developing countries, the firms from developed world made huge amounts of investments to reduce the costs. To this end, developing countries including Turkey, Brazil, Mexico, and Portugal attracted the investments. The producers in Asian markets, responsible for half of ceramic production, and particularly China, have relied on exports since 1990s. This forced the leading countries in the market to change their strategies. At the current point, all countries, after Italy, known for its growing attention on design, high quality and branding, and Spain, focusing on technology-based production, now focus on price competition in the traditional ceramic products (TSSSBEP, Nisan, 2010, p.6)
Table 1 demonstrates that based on the 2008 data on the production of the world ceramic covering materials, China ranks at the top, followed by Brazil, Italy, Spain, India, Iran, Indonesia, Vietnam and Turkey. In terms of exporting ceramic products, China again takes the lead, followed by Italy, Spain, Turkey, Brazil and Mexico. The US ranks first in the import of ceramic products, followed by France, Saudi Arabia, Germany, South Korea, Britain, Russia, and UAE (Saatçioğlu, 2010, pp. 5-13).
Table 1. Production, export and import of ceramic covering materials in the world in 2008. Source: WTO (2009) International trade statistics.
| Country | Production (million m2) | Country | Export (million m2) | Country | Import (million m2) |
| China | 3.400 | China | 570 | US | 152 |
| Brazil | 713 | Italy | 355 | France | 112 |
| Italy | 513 | Spain | 306 | Saudi Arabia | 99 |
| Spain | 495 | Turkey | 92 | Germany | 80 |
| India | 390 | Brazil | 81 | South Korea | 59 |
| Iran | 320 | Mexico | 62 | Britain | 58 |
| Indonesia | 278 | | | Russia | 56 |
| Vietnam | 270 | | | UAE | 55 |
| Turkey | 225 | | | | |