Earthquakes affected numerous factories
Berke Içten, the president of the Turkish footwear manufacturers association, reported that the earthquakes last February destroyed around 400 footwear production units located in the Antakya cluster.
The conglomerate is mainly dedicated to the manufacturing of leather footwear for men, with a majority of small to medium-sized factories employing an average of 20 to 25 workers. The leader stated that the production in Antakya represents approximately 10% of the total footwear manufactured in the country.
The most important clusters include Adana, Antakya, Istanbul, Konya, Izmir and Gaziantep. The national production amounts to approximately 550 million pairs annually, with around 350,000 workers employed in approximately 10,000 manufacturing plants.