Record drought hits Ankara as water shortages continue

Water cuts that have been in effect for several weeks in Ankara, the Turkish capital, are the result of a “record drought,” a municipal official told AFP on Saturday, rejecting accusations of mismanagement.

“2025 was a record year in terms of drought. The volume of water feeding the dams dropped to historically low levels, 182 million m³ for 2025, compared to 400–600 million m³ in previous years. This is the driest period in the past 50 years,” said Memduh Akçay, general director of Ankara municipality’s water authority.

To conserve the city’s dwindling water supply, dam levels have fallen to just 1.12 percent, taps are being shut off for several hours a day in certain neighborhoods following a rotation system, forcing many residents to queue at public fountains to fill water jugs.

These scenes prompted President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan to call the Ankara municipal leaders “incompetent.” City officials, run by the main opposition party, rejected the criticism, saying Ankara is suffering the effects of climate change and rapid population growth, which has doubled since the 1990s to nearly six million residents.

“Besides declining rainfall, irregular precipitation patterns, decreased snowfall, and the rapid conversion of precipitation to runoff due to urbanization are preventing efficient dam replenishment,” Akçay explained.

The municipality said that thanks to a new pumping system that allows water to be drawn from dams below minimum required levels, there will be no cuts this weekend, but warned that the problem will persist unless rainfall increases.

Much of Turkey also experienced a historic drought in 2025. Izmir, the country’s third-largest city on the Aegean coast, has been imposing daily water cuts on some residents since last summer.