2023-06 Factsheet - Türkiye Earthquake 2023

< May 2023

June 2023

Reuters

Highlights

On 6 February 2023, two devastating earthquakes, measuring 7.7 and 7.6 magnitude on the Richter Scale, struck Pazarcık and Elbistan in Kahramanmaraş, Türkiye. The initial earthquake was followed by over 3,100 aftershocks, including a 7.6-magnitude earthquake that hit Elbistan, according to the Turkish Disaster and Emergency Management Presidency (AFAD). Impacts have been felt across the 11 provinces in which a state of emergency has been declared (Adıyaman, Gaziantep, Kilis, Hatay, Malatya, Diyarbakır, Adana, Osmaniye, Kahramanmaraş, Şanlıurfa and Elazığ), with Hatay, Kahramanmaras and Gaziantep provinces reportedly hardest hit. These earthquakes are the largest to hit Türkiye in the last century, and the most significant to strike the country’s south-east region in hundreds of years.

NFI

Shelter

Need analysis

Almost 890.000 units (including non-residential units) are destroyed, demolished, heavily or medium damaged across the 11 affected provinces. An additional 1.8 million units are lightly damaged, but not necessarily habitable.
There are more than 2.6 million people staying in tents, of which at least 200.000 are in formally managed sites. An estimated 2.1 million self-settled people are staying in tents or makeshift shelters in informal sites in urban areas, or nearby their damaged dwellings in peri-urban and rural areas. 85.000 people are staying in containers, in formally managed sites. In an effort to formalize settlements, the number of people in formally managed sites has been increasing compared to the number of self-settled people.
The provinces that reported the highest damage and that were worst affected are Hatay, Kahramanmaras and Gaziantep, while acknowledging the high level of damage as well as needs in the other affected provinces as well.
A severity analysis focusing on the shelter situation of the displaced population (those in formally managed tented and container sites, and those self-settled in informal sites in urban areas or nearby their damaged dwellings in peri-urban and urban areas), indicated that the severity of shelter needs is highest in almost all districts in Hatay, three districts in Kahramanmaras and five districts in Malatya, while the last also faces the lower presence of shelter partners.
Sheltering was the biggest need after the earthquakes. Additionally, there was a need for household items, as well as heaters with temperatures below zero degrees Celsius. With the hot summer months rapidly approaching, summarization kits, including shading materials, are increasingly needed. A scale down of hot meals distribution is leading to additional required kitchen sets to allow people to prepare their own meals.

Response

The Government distributed almost 829,500 tents in the affected areas. In addition to this, they have established almost 94 thousand containers in 145 container cities, with an additional 194 container cities planned. In parallel, those with a heavy or medium damaged dwelling that prefer rental support over a container can apply for financial rental support of 3000 TRY for 12 months.
Complementing the Government’s vision and efforts to speedily achieve emergency shelter solutions and enable families to resume their domestic living, sector partners have primarily focused on resourcing AFAD with in-kind relief items. Almost 1/5^th of the tents distributed by AFAD were provided by the humanitarian community.
Direct shelter support has included provision of the following emergency shelter and basic household items assistance across all 11 affected provinces:
- Over 917 thousand people (241 thousand households), were assisted with emergency shelter (61 per cent of the intended target), mostly tents, but including relief housing units, toolkits and tarpaulins.
- Over 5 million people (1.3 million households) were provided with basic household items including clothing, cooking items, thermal comfort items, safety and security items and sleeping items.

Gaps / challenges

Considering the Government’s formal relief-to-recovery pathway, the scale of need and the humanitarian community limited funding and operational capacity to respond at scale, there may be delays and gaps in assistance, where the priority will be decongesting informal sites and focusing on assisting the most vulnerable people.
There is lack of clarity regarding Government support packages and services available to different groups, particularly for:
- Those in peri-urban, remote and rural areas, with different levels of housing damage, who have chosen to stay on their land, within their community and their networks of support, and with access to their livelihoods.
- Those with lightly damaged dwellings assessed as structurally sound but uninhabitable without significant repairs (or without piped water to the homes) – a considerable proportion of households in tents.