THE PRESS
In Turkey, the competition between the written and visual press is gradually tending towards the written press. The importance carried by the written press because of its nature was shaken for a period of time compared to television and radio, but it started to recover in a short period of time. The annual average number of sale of the 21 newspapers published at the national level has reached 4 million. A significant part of the national press utilizes the highest technology available in the world. According to the polls, the habit of reading newspapers in total population is 66 percent.
Local newspapers, which assumed an influential role during the National War of Independence, have an important function for meeting the need for news of the public. Anadolu Press Association reports that 3,450 periodicals, half of them weekly, are published in Turkey. The average daily circulation of local newspapers varies between 1,000 and 15,000. Local newspapers assume an important duty to provide for the relations among the public institutions, organizations and the citizens and to organize these relations. The local press has been trying to renew itself technologically in recent years. Many local newspapers, which follow the national press in utilizing modern technology, has started to use offset printing techniques.
The number of magazines published on various subjects has increased rapidly in recent years. As a matter of fact, the total number of magazines which was 20 in 1990, reached 110 in 1999. The total circulation of the magazines, which are generally published weekly or monthly, is around 2,300,000. News magazines, which give interesting news stories and detailed information about the subjects of current interest, underwent an important change from the aspect of context and form in recent years. A majority of these have assumed a contemporary appearance and have become attractive from the aspect of printing and presentation. Besides news magazines, the economy magazines, radio and television programs magazines, automobiles, arts, literature, women, men, youth/music magazines are also read with enjoyment by the public.
The readers find a great number of magazines published periodically that consider at length the subjects on the agenda
The economic press, that has a limited group of readers, is concentrated especially on magazines, besides the daily newspapers. Furthermore, illustrated magazines, travel, cuisine, decoration, sports, health, computer and humor magazines are also among the interesting magazines for readers. Turkey, with a fairly old past in the field of humor magazine-printing, is among the leading countries of the world.
The Concentration in the Press and Financing. The activities conducted on income sources based on advertisement revenues and sales in Turkey have shown that the annual average sales of the written press is 400-600 million US dollars from sales alone. The advertisement revenues are close to this figure. According to this, the total annual sales of the written press is around 1 billion US dollars. It is obvious that from the aspect of annual sales, the press sector is an important sector. Furthermore, because of its effectiveness for forming public opinion, it is an area that attracts the entrepreneurs. Consequently, the written press in Turkey is experiencing an important concentration problem.
This causes some problems for employees and the new entrepreneurs rather than for the publication policies and news perceptions of the newspapers. Although there are 21 newspapers at the national level, a significant portion of these are collected among a few groups. However, this situation has not caused problems of significant dimensions for the newspapers to fulfill their functions up until the present.
There are three important press groups in Turkey. One of these is the Dogan Media Group. The Milliyet newspaper, founded by Ali Naci Karacan on 3 May 1950, transformed into a large publication group in the 1990s. A total of 8 of the newspapers published nationwide belong to the Dogan Media Group. The Bilgin Media Group has also an important place in the Turkish press world with its newspapers, magazines and other partnerships within its structure. The İhlas Group is also another known media group with its newspaper, news agency and television both in the press and in other fields of activities. Besides these groups, there are many other media such as the Uzan Media Group, the Aksam Media Group, the Doguş Group and the Feza Journalism with high ratios of readers, viewers and listeners.
Reference: Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Turkey
