ANKARA — From flash
floods to forest fires, drought to "sea
snot", Turkey is bearing the brunt of increasingly frequent disasters
blamed on climate change, putting pressure on President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to
act.
اضافة اعلان
Wildfires that have killed eight people since late July across southern
coastal regions, ravaging forests and turning villages to ash, followed the
growth of a slimy mucus in the Sea of Marmara that destroyed marine life.
Deadly floods in the northeast followed an arid spell that dried up dams,
endangering water supplies.
Sinkholes caused by water mismanagement are
encroaching on farmers' homes.
Experts warn the vast, geographically diverse country risks fighting rolling
disasters if it does not forcefully confront climate change, which is warming
sea temperatures in regions such as the Mediterranean.
A landmark
UN report this week warned that
global warming is occurring far
faster than forecast.
The issue is turning increasingly political, with polls showing it
registering highly with up to seven million members of Generation Z who will be
able to vote in the next election, slated for 2023.
Experts and environmentally conscious politicians put ratifying the 2015
Paris Agreement adopted by 196 countries on top of Turkey's to-do list.
Turkey is one of only six nations, including Iraq and Libya, yet to formally
approve the accord.
"This is the first step. We must become a part of the global fight
against climate change," said Greens of Turkey Party spokeswoman Emine
Ozkan.
"There is no time to lose."
'No comprehensive
policy'
Climate Action Tracker, a think tank that evaluates national emissions
reduction plans, said Turkey's effort towards the accord's goals was
"critically insufficient".
Ankara argues the agreement unfairly classes Turkey as "developed"
rather than "developing", which would give it access to funding.
But experts say Turkey is making the mistake of failing to see critical
issues such as food security and intensifying drought as linked.
"I don't see Turkey having any comprehensive and holistic climate
change policy that addresses everything in an interconnected way," said
water and climate policy researcher Gokce Sencan.
"You cannot separate food security issues from energy security issues,
and food prices from the issue of drought."
Fossil fuels made up 83 percent of Turkey's energy supply in 2019.
The International Energy Agency this year praised Ankara's efforts to
diversify its energy mix, with "impressive" renewable energy growth.
But environmentalists raise concern over Turkey's reliance on polluting
coal, since Ankara has plans to expand domestic coal power capacity despite
targeting a greenhouse gas emissions cut of up to 21 percent by 2030.
Drought the
'biggest risk'
Turkey last month registered its highest temperature since 1961 at 49.1
degrees Celsius (120.4 Fahrenheit) in the southeastern town of Cizre.
Experts say drought will remain a critical problem with far-reaching effects
not only on food production but also Turkey's relations with its neighbors,
which are fighting for water rights.
Dam levels and farmers' production have suffered from below average
precipitation since 2019.
"Drought is the biggest risk that we're facing right now," Sencan
said.
Levent Kurnaz, director of Bogazici University's center for climate change
and policy studies, said the issue was directly related to food and
agriculture.
"If you cannot feed yourselves then you're in big trouble," Kurnaz
said.
Erdogan heeded the calls and organized a water council meeting in March, but
specialists say the government is not taking the issue seriously enough.
"The government supposedly acknowledges climate change, but it does not
take the initiative to look at the real problems that cause it," said
Ozkan, whose party has not been formally registered despite applying last year.
Kurnaz pointed to water's wider impact in the region since Turkey sits on
top of two legendary rivers, the Tigris and Euphrates, which flow to Syria and
Iraq.
"If we don't have enough water, they will not have enough water and
that's a problem in international relations," Kurnaz told AFP.
Sencan said the key is to build water resilience because climate change will
see the amount of precipitation in the eastern Mediterranean region fall.
Public concern for the environment is growing, with a November 2020 study
showing 70 percent of Turks worried about the issue.
For Kurnaz, no single country is prepared for the climate crisis, with both
central and local authorities "underestimating" the issue.
"If you don't learn and something larger happens then you will once
again be unprepared," Kurnaz said.
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