Trade minister Zafer Çaglayan was in Ethiopia in early March to lay the groundwork for a free trade agreement.
Later in the month, Turkish president Abdullah Gül attended the Turkey-Gabon Business Forum in an attempt to build new markets for Turkish exports in the oil-exporting Central African country.
His second stop was Ghana, where a 150-strong political and business delegation had a similar agenda and signed a series of new investment deals.
Following its Asian counterparts in the organisation of high-level political and business summits, the Turkish government is planning a Turkey-Africa conference for 2013.
It plans to double exports to Africa over the next few years from the current level of about $10bn.
Trade with North Africa had already dropped by about $400m in the first quarter of 2011 due to the political instability there.
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