Is Turkey Desert? | Does Turkey Have Any Deserts?

The fact is that many tourists and even people who want to immigrate to Turkey may need to know more about where Turkey is located.

These people need to be aware of the weather conditions of this country, and one of the things that may be a question and debate for them is whether is Turkey desert or green.

Since I have lived in Turkey for more than 3 months and have visited its various cities, I decided to investigate the situation of Turkey in terms of greenery or desert in this article from the Travelling Topic site.

Is Turkey desert?

In general, there is no desert in Türkiye, and most areas are fertile. There are few semi desert areas like Karapınar in Turkey where tourists go for safari.

Now, why do I say that Karapinar is not a desert? According to the DesertMuseum website, places with less than 250 mm (10 inches) of rainfall are deserts, and according to the information I got from the weatherspark website, the rainfall in Karapınar is more than that, and if you add up the amount of rainfall in each month, it will be more than 10 inches.

Global statistics show that Turkey is one of the countries with less water and less rain, and experts in Turkey warn about the increase of deserts in this country.

They believe that with the continuation of drought and climate changes on the one hand and excessive water extraction on the other hand, difficult years will await Turkey.

In the past few years, the rainfall has decreased significantly in the south, southeast, Mediterranean, Anatolia, and Aegean regions. Even in some provinces, farmers have abandoned their agricultural lands and no longer grow crops.

While these areas have been one of Turkey’s leading agricultural production areas in the past, in these parts, the weather has become warmer, and the rain has decreased a lot. Therefore, Turkey is included in the list of countries in danger of desertification.

Does Turkey Have Any Deserts?

Karapinar is one of the cities of Konya province in Central Anatolia. This city is one of Turkey’s regions with the lowest rainfall and is the driest place in Konya province. Due to wind erosion in Karapinar city in 1950, about 103 thousand hectares of land dried up, and due to the movement of dunes in this area, it turned into a semi-desert that expanded over time. This condition caused that it was even suggested to relocate the city.

In 1959, with the cooperation of Turkish engineers and the people of the region, a project to de-desert Karapinar was started to save the region. They created a green space with an area of 130 thousand km in Karapinar.

In this project, reeds were first planted in one part of the desert to slow the wind speed, and vegetation and forest were created in the other. It is interesting to know that this project became a successful model worldwide.

As a result, in areas where wind erosion had turned them into deserts and were previously in the form of dunes. Now, you can see a forest area with different trees and green pastures.

So, as a result of this project, the Karapinar semi-desert has a unique feature that has made it a beautiful semi-desert among other deserts worldwide. Its green part is enormous and artificially created.

The beautiful semi desert of Karapinar is located on the route of the historical Silk Road. It is one of the tourist attractions for domestic and foreign visitors. Also, every year, different experts come to this area to see the lush and beautiful forest of the Karapinar desert, which was created to fight against bad natural conditions.

At the end of the line

As you can see in the picture below, there are few desert areas in Turkey, but all I know is that global warming is happening and if we do not use water resources well, we will see all green areas turn into deserts.

Which category of people are you? Does the desert appeal to you? Or do you not like the hot weather and dry nature? Which aspect of Turkish nature appeals to you? You can share the answers to the above questions with other people in the comments section.

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