In the summer of 2021, violent forest fires in Turkey destroyed several hectares of forest and the livelihoods of numerous people. The Erdogan government has declared that it will help those affected with reconstruction. A visit to a village shows what has become of the promise.
The twins Tao and Doa walk barefoot over dusty earth, past the camping van that has been converted into a temporary home and two unfinished buildings – their future home. Up until a year ago, everything on the property in Kalemler, southern Turkey, was still lush green. The German-Turkish couple Till and Deniz Rautert, parents of Tao and Doa, had set up the artists’ village Tadah here, where painters, writers, acrobats and tightrope walkers came together.
At the end of July 2021, devastating forest fires break out. Within a few hours, numerous houses burn down in Kalemler, and Tadah is also reduced to rubble. As promised by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, things are now being rebuilt – under sometimes questionable conditions.
There is a construction site right at the entrance to the village, 70 kilometers from the Mediterranean city of Antalya. Several buildings in brown and white, built in a country house style, stand close together here in different designs. Toki, the state housing company, is rebuilding Kalemler and other places.
A Toki representative who guides dpa journalists through the construction site does not want to give his name publicly. 52 houses were built in Kalemler alone, mostly fireproof, and there are to be around 600 in the district town of Manavgat, he explains and introduces a man who moved into one of the new houses two weeks ago. On the sidelines, he asks when water and electricity could be turned on. He shouldn’t talk about that now, says the Toki representative. He introduces other owners of the new houses in other villages. Everyone is very grateful and explains that they didn’t have to pay anything for the new houses. A year ago, Erdogan said the state would cover at least part of the cost.
“No one gets anything for free here,” says one resident. He also does not want his name published. “All residents who accepted the help initially had to sign a contract in which they promised to pay half of the construction costs.” Payoff begins after a few years. The crux: How much that will ultimately be is not yet clear. This is also confirmed by the community leader Mustafa Cansiz. Depending on the price, this could be fatal for some residents, he believes. According to Cansiz, a large part of the people in Kalemler live from agriculture. In any case, low earners in Turkey are currently under pressure. The cost of living in the country is rising steadily, inflation is officially at almost 80 percent.
According to the state news agency Anadolu, a total of 180,000 hectares burned down in Turkey a year ago. In Manavgat alone it was 60,000 hectares, and several people died. Among the dead was the German-Turkish couple Andrea and Fahri Y., who could not save themselves from the flames. Their graves can be found in the village cemetery, a few meters from the plot where the new houses will be built.
In the wake of global warming, the Mediterranean region is a “hotspot” when it comes to fires, says geographer Barbaros Gönencgil from Istanbul University. “But you can’t explain the fires with climate change alone. Because more than 90 percent of the forest fires in Turkey are caused by intent or negligence.”
Last year, the government was criticized for poor preparation and, initially, for the lack of fire-fighting aircraft. This year they seem to be better prepared: the province of Antalya has four fire-fighting planes and ten helicopters, says Vedat Dikici, head of the Antalya Forestry Directorate. There would also be 5,000 emergency services and several vehicles. The fire-fighting planes were rented from Spain and Ukraine for the summer, he says. Fires broke out on the Turkish Mediterranean coast in 2022, but have so far been brought under control comparatively quickly.
Back on the property of Till and Deniz Rautert. Only the steel skeleton remains of the glasshouse-like dance hall, which is almost eight meters high. The panes broke in the fire, for days the two and their helpers freed the property from shards. But around the steel skeleton it is sprouting again. Fig, mulberry and oleander bushes grow around a pool.
Nature would probably regenerate itself over time, but a poor country like Turkey doesn’t have that luxury, says ecologist Ali Kavgaci. The wood felled after the fires was sold, and now they are trying to reforest it as quickly as possible. Tao and Doa pluck two cucumbers from the bushes. “It only needed water. Seen from that perspective, the ash was a great fertilizer,” says Jongleur Till. Workshops should take place here again in autumn 2023 at the latest.
