"Turkey is well on its way to becoming one of the world's top twenty economies in terms of competitiveness. The GDP is approximately $164 billion, and almost twice that according to the World Bank's study based on purchasing power parity. The economy has grown at an average annual rate of five per cent for the past ten years, and it ranks at the top among OECD countries. Turkey's domestic market holds 64 million people with a median age of 24. The US Department of Commerce recognised Turkey's growing economic importance by naming it one of the ten Big Emerging Markets. The Department predicts that by the year 2010, these countries will import more from the United States than Japan and Europe combined"