Important Plant Areas of Türkiye

Türkiye was the first country in the world to identify its IPAs and 144 IPAs have been identified, covering 11,301,000 hectares – 13% of Türkiye’s total area. The sites range from 154 to 1,545,632 hectares. Over 50% of the sites qualify as IPAs by meeting more than one criterion. 3,442 rare taxa occur within the 144 IPAs.

Plant diversity

Türkiye has one of the richest floras in the temperate world with at least 8,897 native vascular plant species, including 3,022 endemics. These globally important species and habitats continue to face the familiar threats of habitat fragmentation, landscape change and lack of awareness of their importance. With about 11,000 native vascular plant taxa – and one in every three endemic – the flora of Türkiye is richer than that in any other mainland country in the Western Palaearctic, both in terms of overall plant diversity and endemism. Türkiye has three floristic regions (Euro Siberian, Mediterranean and Irano-Turanian), and is the meeting place of the floras of Europe and Asia. The flora is also of exceptional importance from an economic point of view: major parts of two of the eight centres of crop plant diversity lie within Türkiye; over 350 medicinal plants are collected for trading purposes; and garden plants have been derived from over 200 genera.

Habitats

The habitats mimic this diversity, and range from semi-desert and salt steppe, through Mediterranean cedar/fir forests and temperate rainforest, to a wide range of grassland, wetland, peatland and heathland habitats.

Threats

94% of the IPAs are thought to be threatened to some extent by at least one potentially damaging activity. Threats range from agricultural reclamation, intensive forestry and industrial/urban development to less obvious threats such as the collection of species for trade and the spread of aggressive alien plant species into the environment.

Rapid growth in the agricultural and industrial sectors, combined with a fast-increasing population is placing immense pressures on many of the most threatened species, and the often-unique habitats in which they grow in Türkiye. Few if any of the IPAs identified in the Turkish IPA inventory remain altogether unscathed by the negative impacts of man’s activities.