Prof. Dr. Veysel EROĞLU, Minister of Forestry and Water Affairs, Akif ÖZKALDI, Undersecretary of the Ministry of Forestry and Water Affairs, Prof. Dr. Cumali KINACI, Director General of Water Management, Prof. Dr. Arif ERGİN, President of TÜBİTAK, Prof. Dr. Mehmet ÇELİK, Prof. Dr. Erol ARCAKLIOĞLU, Dr. Orkun HASEKİOĞLU, Vice Presidents of TÜBİTAK, Assoc. Orkun HASEKİOĞLU, TÜBİTAK MAM President Assoc. Prof. Dr. Bahadır TUNABOYLU, officials from the Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Livestock, General Directorate of State Hydraulic Works, Ministry of Environment and Urbanization, Bank of Provinces and faculty members from universities.
Assoc. Prof. Dr. Bahadır TUNABOYLU, Prof. Dr. Cumali KINACI, Prof. Dr. Arif ERGİN and Prof. Dr. Veysel EROĞLU made opening speeches.
Speaking at the meeting, Minister Eroğlu stated that fresh water resources are very scarce in the world and that approximately 2.5 billion people do not have access to sufficient amount of water. Explaining that the amount of precipitation is expected to decrease due to global climate change, Minister Eroğlu said: "In Turkey, a great decrease in precipitation is expected in regions such as the Mediterranean and Southeastern Anatolia within 50 years. In some regions, there may be some instantaneous heavy precipitation." Prof. Dr. Veysel Eroğlu emphasized that Turkey is not a water-rich country and drew attention to the need for a single-handed and smart management of water in Turkey.
TUBITAK President Ergin stated that they have very frequent meetings with international science organizations and that they share their activities with each other and said, "It is possible to see countries in several classes. One class is dealing with local affairs in a way that they are unaware of their own problems. Another class is trying to understand and solve their country-wide problems by needing funding or support from other countries. Some countries are measuring, assessing and taking full control of their own problems and trying to put them in the right place with their own resources. Some countries are well aware of the problems they have solved within their own organization and are trying to export these solutions to other countries. When we look at this category, we see that Turkey has gone through all the stages of all these categories. At the moment, we see that Turkey takes its place in this classification as a country that can measure its own problems, find solutions to them and stand on its own feet. We hope to be able to reach the capacity to help other countries in the future."
Following the opening speeches, Dr. Selma AYAZ, Director of the Environment and Cleaner Production Institute and Project Coordinator, made a presentation on the project. Geographical Information System studies, an important component of the project, were presented by Ömer Visali SARIKAYA, an expert researcher at the Institute of Environment and Cleaner Production. Prof. Dr. Nilsun DEMİR and Prof. Dr. Mustafa DURAN, members of the project team, gave information about biological monitoring studies, while Assoc. Prof. Dr. Ali ERTÜRK gave information about modeling studies.
The closing meeting, where the outputs of the project, which contributed to the management of water resources, which is one of the most important components of the sustainable development of our country, on the basis of basins, was successfully completed with the participation of many institutions and organizations and universities.
