Turkmenistan Environment - 2022

GEOGRAPHICAL NAMES 

Environment - current issues

contamination of soil and groundwater with agricultural chemicals, pesticides; salination, water logging of soil due to poor irrigation methods; Caspian Sea pollution; diversion of a large share of the flow of the Amu Darya into irrigation contributes to that river's inability to replenish the Aral Sea; soil erosion; desertification

Environment - international agreements

party to: Biodiversity, Climate Change, Climate Change-Kyoto Protocol, Climate Change-Paris Agreement, Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban, Desertification, Hazardous Wastes, Ozone Layer Protection, Ship Pollution, Wetlands

signed, but not ratified: none of the selected agreements

Air pollutants

particulate matter emissions: 19.02 micrograms per cubic meter (2016 est.)

carbon dioxide emissions: 70.63 megatons (2016 est.)

methane emissions: 52.09 megatons (2020 est.)

Climate

subtropical desert

Land use

agricultural land: 72% (2018 est.)

arable land: 4.1% (2018 est.)

permanent crops: 0.1% (2018 est.)

permanent pasture: 67.8% (2018 est.)

forest: 8.8% (2018 est.)

other: 19.2% (2018 est.)

Urbanization

urban population: 54% of total population (2023)

rate of urbanization: 2.23% annual rate of change (2020-25 est.)

total population growth rate v. urban population growth rate, 2000-2030

Revenue from forest resources

forest revenues: 0% of GDP (2018 est.)

Revenue from coal

coal revenues: 0% of GDP (2018 est.)

Waste and recycling

municipal solid waste generated annually: 500,000 tons (2013 est.)

Major lakes (area sq km)

salt water lake(s): Caspian Sea (shared with Iran, Azerbaijan, Russia, and Kazakhstan) - 374,000 sq km

Major rivers (by length in km)

Amu Darya (shared with Tajikistan [s], Afghanistan, and Uzbekistan [m]) - 2,620 km
note – [s] after country name indicates river source; [m] after country name indicates river mouth

Major watersheds (area sq km)

Internal (endorheic basin) drainage: (Aral Sea basin) Amu Darya (534,739 sq km)

Total water withdrawal

municipal: 755 million cubic meters (2017 est.)

industrial: 839 million cubic meters (2017 est.)

agricultural: 26.36 billion cubic meters (2017 est.)

Total renewable water resources

24.765 billion cubic meters (2017 est.)

NOTE: The information regarding Turkmenistan on this page is re-published from the 2022 World Fact Book of the United States Central Intelligence Agency and other sources. No claims are made regarding the accuracy of Turkmenistan 2022 information contained here. All suggestions for corrections of any errors about Turkmenistan 2022 should be addressed to the CIA or the source cited on each page.