The "Communiqué regarding the Determination of the Production Year of Motor Vehicles and Trailers" (SGM-2011/12) (published in the Official Gazette dated July 23, 2011 and No.28003) (the “New Communiqué”) has become effective as of January 1, 2012 and abolished the “Communiqué regarding the Determination of the Model Year of Motor Vehicles and Trailers" (Communiqué No. SGM-2010/13) (published in the Official Gazette dated December 17, 2010 and No. 27788) (the “Abolished Communiqué”). The New Communiqué regulates the determination of the model year of vehicles imported into and of vehicles produced or assembled in Turkey and explicitly clarifies that the production year of a vehicle shall be its model year. In other words, with the New Communiqué, the broken year system, where the model year was determined based on the date of the conformity certificate, is abandoned and as of January 1, 2011, the model year of vehicles will be the same as their production year. Below is a chart illustrating the model year determination according to the Abolished Communiqué and the New Communiqué.

Date of the conformity certificate    Model Year    Legislation
Before August 1, 2010    2010    Abolished Communiqué
August 1, 2010 - June 31, 2011    2011    Abolished Communiqué
August 1, 2011 - December 31, 2011    2012    Abolished Communiqué
Date of production    Model Year    Legislation
January 1, 2012 - December 31, 2012    2012    New Communiqué
January 1, 2013 - December 31, 2013    2013    New Communiqué

The Council of Ministers Decree No. 2009/14802 enacted on 16 March 2009 has introduced reduced special consumption tax rates applicable until 15 June 2009. Accordingly, as of 16 June 2009, a new Council of Ministers Decree (No. 2009/15081) inserted the amended rates for motor vehicles. The list of rates included in the recent Decree No. 2009/15801 raises the rates slightly to the level in force before the initial reduction of Decree No. 2009/14802.