Know thy customer. Turkish growth.
Digital Governance Minister Kyriakos Pierrakakis presented a new digital platform named “Know Your Customer” to Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis on Thursday which allows citizens to complete transactions and requests online instead of in person at banks. Established in the context of the ministry’s broad digital transformation of public services, the new platform allows citizens and businesses to remotely update personal information or complete bureaucratic tasks by submitting official state documents and other required certificates. The platform also simplifies the process of opening a new bank account or managing an existing one, noted the prime minister, helping to “eliminate bureaucracy and protecting personal data and information even more efficiently.” Improvements of this kind will continue in all sectors and are part of what the national recovery plan “Greece 2.0” will fund, continuing this digital transformation, Mitsotakis said. The service will soon be extended to include transactions with telecommunications providers and insurance funds, Pierrakakis pointed out. The new platform “is one of those reforms that are not visible but are fundamental in saving time, cost and hassle,” said Bank of Greece Governor Yannis Stournaras at the meeting. Bureaucracy is minimized and daily life is made easier for the citizen through the “Know Your Customer” platform, said Finance Minister Christos Staikouras.
Turkey’s finance minister said on Thursday that the country’s gross domestic product will grow at a more than 5% rate this year, helped along by export growth of between 16% and 20% after a pandemic-hit 2020. In a televised interview on CNN Turk, Lutfi Elvan repeated the economy would log double-digit GDP growth in the second quarter. Defense and auto exports will help balance the large current account deficit, he added. A Reuters poll from April 6-13 forecast 4.8% economic growth in 2021, and 14.9% in the second quarter due to a so-called base effect after a pandemic-hit 2020. The economy expanded 1.8% last year.