Türkiye’s OSBs reach 416, students hit record 115,000

President of the Organized Industrial Zones Supreme Organization (OSBÜK), Memiş Kütükcü, told an Anadolu Agency (AA) correspondent that organized industrial zones (OIZs) are a planned industrialization model that serves as an example to the world.

Emphasizing that OIZs now the driving force of investment, production, employment, and exports across Türkiye’s 81 provinces have never abandoned the goal of developing the country through production in 2025, Kütükcü said:
“In 2025, electricity consumption in our OIZs, which is the most concrete indicator of production, increased by 2.91 percent compared to 2024. Moreover, in December 2025, electricity consumption—and thus production—in our OIZs rose by a strong 6.9 percent compared to December 2024.”

Kütükcü also noted that OIZs make significant contributions to Türkiye’s energy infrastructure, stating that renewable energy capacity within OIZs increased by 47 percent year-on-year in 2025, rising from 3,460 megawatts to 5,086 megawatts.

Pointing out that installed capacity of solar power plants within renewable energy investments reached 4,616 megawatts, Kütükcü said that 7 percent of Türkiye’s total installed power plant capacity and 21 percent of unlicensed solar power plant (SPP) capacity are located within OIZs.

Seven new OIZs established in 2025

Providing information on newly established OIZs last year, Kütükcü said:
“Seven new OIZs were established in seven provinces—Ankara, Batman, Çorum, Giresun, Gümüşhane, Samsun, and Yozgat. Thus, the total number of OIZs in Türkiye reached 416, with 371 affiliated with the Ministry of Industry and Technology and 45 with the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry. The number of factories in OIZs exceeded 68,000. In 2025, OIZs provided employment for an additional 14,324 people, bringing total employment to over 2.7 million.”

Historic record in vocational education

Stating that vocational education had been neglected for many years in Türkiye but that recent investments and awareness efforts in vocational and technical education are now yielding tangible results, Kütükcü continued:

“As OIZs, we carried out significant efforts in 2025 to make vocational and technical education the number one agenda item in Türkiye. For the first time, the number of students receiving vocational education in OIZs exceeded 100,000, setting a historic record. While there were a total of 89,540 students in vocational and technical Anatolian high schools, vocational training centers, and vocational higher schools within our OIZs in 2024, this figure rose to 114,653 in 2025. This historic increase—reflecting young people’s growing interest in vocational education within OIZs and in the heart of production—is both highly encouraging and an extremely strategic choice for the future of our country’s production.”