Asst.Prof.Dr. Fatih YİĞİT and Res.Asst. İsmail CANÖZ from the Faculty of Political Sciences, Department of Management presented the results of their research titled “The Impact of Energy Investments on Regional Development”, in which they investigated the effects of energy policies on the economic growth of regions, at the International Congress of Economics, Politics, Humanities and Social Sciences held in Batman on March 24-25, 2022.
Advances in technology and economic globalization have put countries in a race in terms of production. While large economies and developed countries stand out in this competition, developing countries that are striving to be included in this competition primarily focus on their domestic issues. In this context, the research focuses on the relationship between energy investments and economic growth, recognizing that Turkey is dependent on foreign sources for energy access and consumption, which is a major and ongoing economic problem for the country. The research revealed that especially recently, energy investments have been given great importance in Turkey, and that economic breakthroughs in this sector have intensified with the energy policies developed. In addition, based on the hypothesis that the increase in energy investments in Turkey, where the socio-economic development differences between regions have reached significant dimensions, will positively affect many parameters representing regional development and growth, the research revealed the existence of these positive effects through a number of econometric methodologies. Thus, the effects of energy investments on regional development were observed. The results of the research revealed that the reduction of Turkey’s dependence on foreign energy will enable the country to transform the expenses arising from high energy costs into domestic and value-added production investments, thus contributing strongly to regional development in Turkey.