Demirayak was speaking at a meeting on irrigation systems in Konya, where she noted that Turkey has lost a large proportion of its available water supplies over the last 40 years. Demirayak said the fresh water availability per person per year has fallen from 4,000 cubic meters to 1,430 cubic meters in the last 20 years, adding that by 2030 this number will have dropped to 1,100 cubic meters in Turkey, which is predicted to have a population of 100 million by then. Areas with water availability below 2,000 cubic meters per person per year are considered water-poor.Demirayak also noted that more than 50 percent of the water used for irrigation evaporates before reaching plant roots due to widespread use of conventional watering methods. "These are more than enough reasons for us to start looking at ways to develop and update our irrigation methods," she stated. The WWF Turkey general manager also emphasized that the concept of more watering equals more fertility is wrong, adding that drip irrigation can decrease water usage by more than 50 percent. Moreover, she noted, the fertility of one agricultural area on drip irrigation increased by 10 percent for wheat and 25 percent for sugar beets.
Demirayak also emphasized that the cost of drought to the world is $42 billion annually. "We also want to explore solutions to the misusage of groundwater. There are 92,000 wells in Konya Basin and 66,000 of them are unregistered. We have to control illegal irrigation in the Konya Basin."
