RESTRUCTURING AND NEW SPATIAL TENDENCIES IN ANKARA FURNITURE SECTOR 

The furniture industry has been restructured in both developed and developing countries after the 1980s with the impact of developments in transportation and communication, globalisation, new production technologies and flexible production methods. While the conventional production of the furniture industry is moved to developing countries, design-oriented, high value-added production is kept in developed countries and realised for niche markets through investments in new technologies. Developing countries, on the other hand, are turning towards an export-oriented production and design, investing in technology, and developing their production infrastructures to acquire a larger share in the process of moving the conventional production to developing countries. The opportunities offered by new technologies in adapting to uncertain/ variable demand play an important role in ensuring competitiveness by increasing productivity and quality in production. The purpose of this study is to reveal the effects of new technologies on the spatial restructuring process of the furniture industry. In the field study, the Ankara Furniture Industry, where computer-aided design and manufacturing systems have been intensively introduced into the production process since the mid-2000s, is taken into consideration. The restructuring process based on new technologies also transforms the spatial structure of the industry in Ankara Metropolitan Area. In the study, non-probability purposive sampling method was used, and in-depth interviews were conducted with 80 firms that have renewed their technology and 40 firms that have not renewed their technology in order to provide a comparison. In-depth interviews with firms reveal the structural and spatial restructuring processes of new technologies by changing the production organisation and labour processes in firms. While the findings of the study reveal that new technologies, on the one hand, support the relocation and agglomeration/clustering tendencies of firms, on the other hand, it indicates that a significant portion of large firms that renew technology have chosen to locate in new agglomeration areas in and outside the urban periphery, unlike the literature on agglomeration and clustering areas based on small and medium-sized firms. In this process, it is seen that the externalities offered in organised industrial zones and the incentives of the local government including the provision of suitable land in unorganised areas are decisive.