From Bedesten to Digital Bazaar: The Grand Transformation
The Problem
Southeastern Anatolia Project Regional Development Administration (GAP) is one of the biggest regional development organizations in Turkey, and needs to develop a clearly well-identified strategy document on digitalization of producers and social enterprises covering nine cities in the Southeastern part of Turkey. The main challenges of the region are limited access to digital markets and lack of technical capacity in production, distribution and integration to marketplaces.
The Solution
A solid digitalization strategy can emerge as a key milestone to determine the route of digital transformation of the region. When considering the wide range scale of the region, the experts’ feedback needed to be enriched with the field observations and direct touch with beneficiaries to determine the requirements of the grand strategy.
To investigate the main challenges on the digitalization agenda of GAP, two workshops (problem seeking & solution) were implemented with the participation of experts from e-commerce platforms to experts in regional development. The roadmap with reflections of the workshop was prepared and presented to GAP Administration.
The Impact
After the roadmap for digitalization of the cooperatives and social entrepreneurs, the field visits covering 9 cities at SoE of Turkey was held to profile the potential producers and production capacities for digital marketing. Profiling process has been enriched with expert reports to enlighten the GAP Administration’s region in the context of digital transformation.
