Page 31 - Çevre Şehir İklim İngilizce - Sayı 3

Mehmet Emin Birpınar - Ersin Gürtepe

solid fuels such as coal causing high emissions, and the first successful
implementation has been the transformation of 1,100 houses in the historical
Mevlâna region of Konya, preventing the release of at least 1,200 tons of
pollutants annually (Birpınar- Gürtepe, 2022; Haberler.com, 2022).
In light of these considerations, the preparations for the “Strategy Paper
on Green Transformation in Heating” have been started by the Ministry. It is
aimed that the activities will be completed and shared with the public soon
(Ministry of Environment, Urbanization and Climate Change of the Republic
of Türkiye, 2022).

A New Period in Waste and Resource Management: Circular Economy
In the period following the first circular economy plan published by the
EU in 2015, in Türkiye, an action plan project has been prepared and put into
practice with respect to the transition from the “take-use-throw” culture,
which is the current traditional production and consumption method, to the
circular economy, which is inspired by nature and is an independent source-
based growth approach based on “take-use-reuse-recover-recycle”.
On the other side, within the scope of the zero waste movement, which
was launched in late 2017 and implemented under the auspices of Ms Emine
Erdoğan, the waste recovery rate increased by 15 points to 28% over a 5-year
period, and hence around 9 million tons of waste has been processed instead
of being disposed of by burial, and reintegrated into the value chain and
provided to industrialists as cheap raw materials, resulting in protection of
resources, reduction of emissions and in economic gains. Moreover, with the
landfills and more than one thousand wastewater treatment plants built all
over Türkiye, the receiving environments such as soil and water resources
are protected and the formation of methane emissions, which is one of the
important greenhouse gases, is prevented, and the landfill gas formed in the
facilities is collected separately and energy production is provided (ZERO
WASTE, 2022).
Also, the practice of eco-label, which is becoming gradually widespread
in the world, has also been emphasized in Türkiye, and in 2018, the National
Environmental Labeling System was developed considering the environmental
factors in all processes of products and services, based on the principle of
resource efficiency, and finally, by joining the Global Eco-Label Network (GEN),
the validity and recognition of the National Environmental Labeling System
of Türkiye was ensured at the international level ( Ministry of Environment,
Urbanization and Climate Change of the Republic of Türkiye, 2022).
For the protection of the water resources of Türkiye, contributions to the
protection of vital fluids have been made through activities such as the transition

16 Journal of Environment, Urbanization and Climate