Focus on cultural heritage in the context of disaster risk reduction activities in Türkiye

As a result of the earthquake that occurred on 6 February 2023, particularly in Kahramanmaraş Pazarcık, Türkiye, more than 50,000 people lost their lives, more than 100,000 were injured, destruction occurred in an area of more than 120,000 square kilometres inhabited by 14 million people, and the general life of society was disrupted. In addition to the structural damage to buildings, the disaster impacted strongly on cultural heritage many times causing collapses and destruction.

This earthquake is just one of the examples that have clearly demonstrated the importance of an increased cooperation between disaster management and cultural heritage institutions in protecting cultural heritage from the effects of disasters.

This paper explains the approach to risk reduction in Türkiye; after sharing the key elements of the Turkish Disaster Risk Reduction Plan (TARAP), it analyses the disaster risk reduction activities carried out at national and local levels from the strategic and operational perspective.
KEYWORDS: disaster risk reduction, planning, prevention, cultural heritage. In PROCULTHER-NET 2 Project. Technical Bulletin N. 4, December 2024, pp 10 - 21