Prospects of Köprülü Kanyon National Park for meeting both conservation targets and people's need for development

Abstract

Köprülü Kanyon National Park is one of the largest National Parks in Turkey. Besides Olympos and Termessos National Park which are not documented at all with a distinct scientific resolution, the reference area is the only park in the East Mediterranean. Through the activities of the UNESCO concept for biosphere reserves it might be possible to match the world interest with local peoples needs. The Köprülü Kanyon National Park comprises the whole range of vegetational zones from thermo-Mediterranean to alpine environments; it also includes a well balanced proportion of natural and manmade ecosystem fragments with transient gradients, i.e. a variety of agro-silvo-pastoral subsystems. The paper discusses options for development of the area focussing on different scales, interests and addresses. Worldwide interest is to be expected for the idea of making Köprülü Kanyon National Park part of a biosphere reserve network along a transect from the Mediterranean to Inner Anatolia which necessarily must have impact on the International Geosphere Biosphere Programme and on the International Sustainable Biosphere Initiative, as it would be difficult to find better reference areas than here. Furthermore local and regional development concepts are discussed which include a local horticulture industry, a regional botanic garden, medicinal plants production and a regional research centre. All these options are intended to give prospects for those people living in the National Park and those living in the developed world heavily depending on the bioresources of the lesser developed world though this relation is only occasionally realised as such.