Speaking at the opening ceremony President Abdullah Gül stated that peace and security at home and ensuring stability and tranquility as well as removing threats in the world were the first requirement and condition. Without security at home, a life with democracy, peace and tranquility could not be possible. President Gül, in drawing attention to the fact that Turkey had in particular given tremendous importance to the defence industry in the last few years said: “Great strides have been taken. In particular, in terms of the design of production and the use of local availability in the defence industry, significant developments have been accomplished. We always take pride in sharing these opportunities with friendly countries. Leaving aside production, Turkey has reached the level of large defence industry corporations that design, work, that plan and undertake research at the highest level and in which each corporation employs over a thousand engineers.”

Minister of National Defence M. Vecdi Gönül in his opening remarks indicated that this year’s 10th International Defence Industry Fair (IDEF 11) was the largest in the region and among the leading fairs in the world and added that IDEF is a significant international cooperation and promotion platform that enables worldwide defence industry corporations to meet and by providing the opportunity for bilateral meetings lays the foundation for defence industry collaboration among nations.

Gönül said that their objective was to structure the Turkish defence industry where local design takes place, where indigenous domestic solutions can be presented and that can compete in the international arena, and that since the year 2000 they were working in line with this objective in the defence industry.

Indicating that the direct procurement rate in meeting the requirements of the Turkish Armed Forces in 2010 dropped below 10 percent, Gönül said that Turkey exports to the world the systems she develops and that total defence and aerospace exports were 853.5 million dollars as of 2010.

Among the systems that take place in the inventory of the Turkish Armed Forces and exported to various countries Gönül said, was night vision and target systems; electronic combat and testing and training systems; frequency hopping radio; software-based radio; fire control systems; armored vehicles; coast guard boats; new type patrol boats; buses; fixed wing aircraft simulators and small unmanned airborne vehicles. Gönül stated that at present there were on-going indigenous design and development projects and that the national tank, national ship; Hurricane and Panther howitzers; coast guard boats; new type patrol boats; jammer systems; FLIR night vision system; medium and long range antitank guided missile; NBS protective clothing projects; unmanned airborne vehicles (Anka and Karayel) and basic training aircraft projects were rapidly continuing.