Despite mismanaging the country’s economy while failing to curb inflation amid
a cratering currency, Turkey’s government has used the tourism sector to
maintain a reliable source of revenue. Unfortunately, this profitable financial
safety net — worth nearly $25 billion in 2021 — has come at the cost of
Turkey’s environment.
اضافة اعلان
One of the most enraging examples of this tradeoff
surfaced in July, when news broke that an archaeologically significant coastal
area had been sold to Cengiz Insaat, a construction company with close ties to
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. The company is building a Bulgari Hotel on a
68-hectare plot in Bodrum’s Cennet Bay — despite the fact that the state
council twice rejected the project. But so far, no amount of public protest has
managed to derail construction.
Worse, it is not the first time the pristine tract
of coastal paradise has fallen victim to the shovel. In 2012, the same thing
happened in the same location, when roughly 245 hectare were sold to the
Mandarin Oriental hotel chain. During that project, some 10,000 olive trees
were removed to make room for luxury accommodations.
There is an old myth in Turkey that the government
starts forest fires to make space for tourism facilities. While the conspiracy
predates the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), which was founded in
2001, the government’s lack of environmental policies has turned accusation
into fact for many voters. At the very least, as forester, academic, and Yesil
Gazete columnist Cihan Erdonmez notes, it is indisputable that the party has
bureaucratically cleared forests for the industry.
In the Turkish constitution, Article 169 forbids
repurposing burnt forests for development, but the law is not as strict for
existing forests. Currently, forestlands can be cleared for “national security”
reasons or in “the interest of the public/common good”. This, combined with a
1982 law encouraging tourism infrastructure, has created the perfect loophole
for Erdogan’s party.
Since July 2021, the ministry of culture and tourism
has overseen forestland development and been the sole decision maker on project
proposals. Erdonmez calculates that 750,000 hectare of forest — some 3 percent
of the country’s total forested area — have been allocated using the various
loopholes. And as Erdogan Suzer, a journalist at Sozcu, reported last year, the
only criterion for tourism facilities to be built is to pay the government for
the trees removed.
Projects such as Bodrum’s Mandarin Oriental and its
new neighbor, Bulgari Hotel, are just two examples of many. In July, eight
neighborhoods in Istanbul’s Beykoz district had their protected area status
revoked, spreading fear of further environmental pillaging.
In May 2021, Turkish social media exploded with outrage at a promotional video by the country’s tourism ministry that shamelessly promoted Turkey as a go-to holiday destination — even as Turks themselves were in lockdown. Turkey was the fourth-most-visited country in 2021, with more than 29 million visitors.
That the AKP does not prioritize the environment is
no secret. Leaders have long ignored the risk of climate change, for example,
despite Turkey’s struggles with the consequences. In November 2019, Erdogan
demonstrated his disinterest in the topic when he launched a tree-planting
campaign that foresters later said would end in failure because saplings cannot
survive when planted so late in the fall. Amid such comical gaffs, it is not
hard to see why many people assume the AKP values tourism over environmental
protection.
Tourism is a damaging pastime for the planet. More
travel means more garbage, an overuse of water supplies, and a drastic increase
in heat-trapping emissions. The World Counts project, a data-driven initiative
to inspire awareness of global challenges, marks the exponential growth of
tourism as one of the major threats to the environment. Every year, 1.4 billion
tourists circulate the globe. This number has more than tripled since 1990.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, Turkey was one of the
few countries that stayed open to foreign arrivals. In May 2021, Turkish social
media exploded with outrage at a promotional video by the country’s tourism
ministry that shamelessly promoted Turkey as a go-to holiday destination — even
as Turks themselves were in lockdown. Turkey was the fourth-most-visited
country in 2021, with more than 29 million visitors.
That number is expected to surge in the coming
years. By 2028, Turkey aims to host 100 million tourists, and Mehmet Nuri
Ersoy, Turkey’s minister of culture and tourism, says the target is likely to
be met. (Benefiting will be Ersoy himself, who recently secured two hotel
projects worth billions in Antalya).
Much to the dismay of environmentalists, tourism is
an untouchable source of revenue for the AKP regime. Turkey has used the
tourism industry at the expense of its own citizens — domestic tourism
plummeted this year as the lira plunged and prices surged — and it keeps doing
so at the expense of its environment.
To be sure, tourism is a short-term solution that
allows for fast cash from abroad. But it will not solve the country’s more
endemic problems. Relying on tourism for stable jobs and capital is an
unsustainable business model, and yet, with a weak economy that has deprived citizens
of economic prosperity, tourism is a necessary evil in Turkey.
The challenge, then, is balancing the influx of
tourists without destroying the very reasons why they come — like untouched
forests and marine views. If the AKP keeps paving over the Turkish Riviera with
five-star hotels, it will not be long before there is no one arriving to fill
them.
Alexandra de Cramer is a journalist based in Istanbul. She reported on the Arab Spring from
Beirut as a Middle East correspondent for Milliyet newspaper. Her work ranges
from current affairs to culture, and has been featured in Monocle, Courier
Magazine, Maison Francaise, and Istanbul Art News. Syndication Bureau.
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