Members of the Project's Technical Assistance Team together with international and local experts conducted the first meeting of the Clustering Strategy Task Group, which took place on June 5, 2008 in Ankara.

Tarik Sonmez, the PCU Director introduced the Project to the members of the Task Group which included representatives from the Key Stakeholders of the Project.

The organisations, which took part in, the meeting were:

• Undersecretariat for Foreign Trade;
• Ministry of Industry and Trade;
• Undersecretariat of Treasury;
• Ministry of Culture and Tourism;
• Ministry of Agriculture;
• State Planning Organisation;
• KOSGEB;
• TOBB;
• TUBITAK;
• TIM;
• TUSIAD;
• MUSIAD; and
• Middle East Technical University.

The participants took part in discussions on the various stages of policy-making in the field of clustering and were provided with international examples in this regard. The workshop concluded with a discussion on clustering related regulations and current programmes in Turkey.