Tebboune, Erdogan Hold One-To-One Meeting Ahead Of Strategic Cooperation Council In Ankara
By Dr. Hana Saada
President Abdelmadjid Tebboune held a one-to-one meeting on Wednesday evening with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan at the presidential lounge of Esenboğa International Airport in Ankara, shortly after arriving in Turkey for an official visit aimed at deepening bilateral strategic cooperation.
Earlier, Erdoğan officially welcomed Tebboune upon his arrival in the Turkish capital, where the Algerian president is expected to co-chair, alongside his Turkish counterpart, the inaugural session of the Algerian-Turkish High-Level Strategic Cooperation Council.
According to the Algerian presidency, the visit forms part of ongoing efforts to strengthen relations of fraternity, political coordination and economic cooperation between the two countries, amid steadily expanding Algerian-Turkish ties across trade, investment, industry and regional diplomacy.
The meeting comes against the backdrop of steadily intensifying Algerian-Turkish ties, with Ankara emerging over recent years as one of Algeria’s most active non-European economic partners. Successive high-level visits — including Erdoğan’s trips to Algeria in 2020, 2022 and 2023 — have accelerated political coordination and economic engagement between the two countries.
Bilateral trade has now exceeded $6.5bn, with both governments targeting $10bn in medium-term exchanges. Turkish involvement in Algeria has evolved beyond conventional trade toward long-term industrial investment, logistics, manufacturing and strategic production sectors viewed as central to Algeria’s economic diversification agenda.
One of the most significant indicators of this expansion remains Turkish foreign direct investment. Around 1,600 Turkish companies currently operate in Algeria, representing an estimated investment stock of $7.7bn across sectors including steel, textiles, construction, public works, agro-industry, household appliances, plastics and construction materials. Few foreign partners maintain such a visible industrial footprint within Algeria’s productive economy.
Algeria’s large domestic market, geographic proximity to Turkey, competitive energy costs, available labour force and import-substitution policies have collectively reinforced the country’s attractiveness for Turkish manufacturers seeking regional industrial platforms.
The Turkish steel producer Tosyali has become one of the clearest symbols of this industrial partnership. Its integrated steel complex in Oran has expanded into a major production hub serving both domestic demand and export markets. Algerian policymakers increasingly view such projects as strategically valuable because they combine industrial integration, local value creation, employment generation and export capacity at a time when Algeria seeks to reduce dependence on hydrocarbon revenues.
Turkish companies have also secured a strong presence in Algeria’s construction and public works sectors, benefiting from competitive execution costs and extensive experience in emerging markets. Their role expanded further as Algeria tightened restrictions on finished-product imports in order to encourage local manufacturing and assembly operations.
For Turkish investors, Algeria increasingly offers a dual strategic advantage: access to a consumer market of more than 45 million people and a gateway toward broader African and Maghreb markets.
From Algeria’s perspective, Turkey occupies a distinct position among international partners. Ankara is not solely an energy customer nor an investor concentrated in service activities. The relationship is comparatively diversified and relatively balanced, even if Algerian exports remain dominated by natural gas and energy derivatives while Turkish exports cover equipment, industrial inputs, semi-finished goods and consumer products.
Turkey continues to import Algerian liquefied natural gas and other energy products, reinforcing Algeria’s role as a reliable energy supplier at a time of global supply-chain fragmentation and heightened competition over strategic resources.
Connectivity between the two countries has also accelerated sharply. According to Turkish diplomatic figures, weekly flights between Algeria and Turkey have risen from 35 to 80, reflecting expanding business mobility, tourism, academic exchanges and commercial activity.
Institutional and financial integration is likewise deepening. The opening in early 2025 of the first branch of Turkey’s agricultural bank in Algeria was viewed as an additional sign of Ankara’s long-term economic anchoring in the country, supporting investment financing, payment mechanisms and broader commercial ecosystems.
Similarly, Turkey’s inauguration of a consulate general in Oran reflects the growing strategic importance of western Algeria, particularly as a hub for industrial, logistical and port-related activities linked to Turkish investments.
Officials on both sides are expected to discuss a wide range of economic dossiers during Tebboune’s visit, including industrial investment expansion, banking facilitation, logistics cooperation, steel production, textiles, construction materials, energy and agricultural transformation industries.
The visit takes place within a broader international context marked by supply-chain fragmentation, intensifying global trade competition and increasing strategic rivalry over African markets. Against this backdrop, Algiers and Ankara appear determined to move beyond transactional trade ties toward a longer-term model centred on co-production, industrial integration and durable regional presence.
For Algeria, the partnership supports broader ambitions to accelerate industrialisation, diversify exports and strengthen regional economic influence. For Turkey, Algeria represents a stable Mediterranean partner, a strategic energy supplier and a critical gateway toward North Africa and the Sahel.
The significance of Tebboune’s visit therefore lies not only in the scale of existing trade and investment figures, but also in the shared political intention to transform this growing economic relationship into a more structured lever for industrial growth, regional influence and strategic cooperation.
