Turkish media has highlighted Syrian construction engineer Mohammed al-Shehab, whose company has become “the best and most successful” Turkish companies engaged in the manufacture and trade of Turkish marble.
According to a report on the Turkish CNN website on Friday (May 25th), Al-Shehab became an exporter of Turkish marble with the success story of its founder, who started it from scratch.
Al-Shehab now exports Turkish marble to 17 countries, through an electronic commerce initiated by “Facebook” to lead his company in the Turkish city of Izmir.
Al-Shehab, a native of Aleppo, said in the report that he was introduced to Turkey in 2013, and in a $ 500 pocket, he then began working in the workshops as a normal laborer to support her family.
And moves between several works from an electrician to a paint agent until the situation stabilizes in Aleppo, but when he realizes that the crisis will last, he returns to Aleppo to sell his car and share in a house he owns and leave for Izmir, with a sum of three thousand dollars.
He then founded his company, which attracted visits from all over the Arab world, and began marketing some Turkish products, through which he knew about Saudi customers.
They learned that they were close to the royal family in Saudi Arabia, and organized tours for them, and through them began marketing Turkish marble to the Gulf States.
He said he started buying marble from workshops in Denizli, Mugla and Opium. As demand grew in the Gulf market, he decided to open his own workshop in Izmir, earning millions of dollars in profits.
The engineer does not think of returning to Syria, after working as an employee in the municipality in Aleppo, becoming a marble exporter in Turkey with more than $ 1 million a year.
“I thought the war would end in two or three months when I came to Izmir and lived with one of my relatives, but the situation is worse than I thought,” he said. I trusted Turkey, which is now my country and painted my way with my hand. Even my friends who went to Europe did not have this opportunity. ”
More than 3.5 million Syrians live in Turkey, spread across Turkey.
More than 6,500 Syrian-established companies have been registered on Turkish territory between 2011 and 2018, according to a report released by the Turkish Economic Policy Research Center last February.
In the case of calculating the informal sector, the Syrian Economic Forum, which deals with business initiatives among members of the Syrian community in Turkey, the number of more than ten thousand companies.
The 2017 report of the Economists’ Platform, which oversees the program to improve the situation of Syrians in Turkey, stated that Syrian investments amounted to more than $ 360 million through their contributions over the past six years.
