Balkan Region () is the westernmost of the five

regions of Turkmenistan Turkmenistan is divided into five regions, or ''welaýatlar'' (singular ''Wilaya, welaýat'') and one capital city (''şäher'') with provincial legal status. They are Ahal Region, Ahal, Balkan Region, Balkan, Daşoguz Region, Dashoguz, Lebap Re ...

. Clockwise from north it borders

Kazakhstan Kazakhstan, officially the Republic of Kazakhstan, is a landlocked country primarily in Central Asia, with a European Kazakhstan, small portion in Eastern Europe. It borders Russia to the Kazakhstan–Russia border, north and west, China to th ...

Uzbekistan , image_flag = Flag of Uzbekistan.svg , image_coat = Emblem of Uzbekistan.svg , symbol_type = Emblem of Uzbekistan, Emblem , national_anthem = "State Anthem of Uzbekistan, State Anthem of the Republ ...

(north); two provinces of Turkmenistan (east),

Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI) and also known as Persia, is a country in West Asia. It borders Iraq to the west, Turkey, Azerbaijan, and Armenia to the northwest, the Caspian Sea to the north, Turkmenistan to the nort ...

(south), and the

Caspian Sea The Caspian Sea is the world's largest inland body of water, described as the List of lakes by area, world's largest lake and usually referred to as a full-fledged sea. An endorheic basin, it lies between Europe and Asia: east of the Caucasus, ...

(west). The capital city is Balkanabat, formerly known as Nebit Dag. The region's boundaries are identical to those of the former ''Krasnovodsk Oblast''', a Soviet-era province of the

Turkmen Soviet Socialist Republic The Turkmen Soviet Socialist Republic, also known as Soviet Turkmenistan, the Turkmen SSR, TuSSR, Turkmenistan, or Turkmenia, was one of the constituent republics of the Soviet Union located in Central Asia existed as a republic from 1925 to 199 ...

with its capital in the city of Krasnovodsk. This oblast was liquidated and restored repeatedly in the 20th century, concluding with its abolition in 1988. However, the administrative boundaries of the region were restored in 1991 when Balkan Region was established with its capital being moved to Nebit Dag which was later renamed Balkanabat. The province covers 139,270 square kilometers and counts 529,895 residents (2022 estimate). A large minority of these are nomadic herding families.''Statistical Yearbook of Turkmenistan 2000-2004'', National Institute of State Statistics and Information of Turkmenistan, Ashgabat, 2005. Its population density of 3.8 persons per square kilometer is the lowest in Turkmenistan. Other cities include:

Bereket Bereket, formerly Gazanjyk or ''Kazandzhik'' ( or gɑˈzɑnd͡ʒik), is a List of cities in Turkmenistan, city in Balkan Province in western Turkmenistan. Bereket is the administrative centre of Bereket District. Bereket is located in an oasis ...

, Türkmenbaşy, Gumdag,

Serdar Serdar may refer to * Serdar (given name) * Serdar (surname) Serdar is a surname of the following notable people: * Can Serdar (born 1996), German-Turkish football midfielder * Emerîkê Serdar (1935–2018), Kurdish-Yezidi writer from Armenia * I ...

, Hazar, Etrek, and Esenguly. Balkan Region has significant hydrocarbon reserves, which in 2019 accounted for 13.9% of Turkmenistan's

natural gas Natural gas (also fossil gas, methane gas, and gas) is a naturally occurring compound of gaseous hydrocarbons, primarily methane (95%), small amounts of higher alkanes, and traces of carbon dioxide and nitrogen, hydrogen sulfide and helium ...

production and 93.1% of its

petroleum Petroleum, also known as crude oil or simply oil, is a naturally occurring, yellowish-black liquid chemical mixture found in geological formations, consisting mainly of hydrocarbons. The term ''petroleum'' refers both to naturally occurring un ...

production. It also generated 15.4% of the country's

electric power Electric power is the rate of transfer of electrical energy within a electric circuit, circuit. Its SI unit is the watt, the general unit of power (physics), power, defined as one joule per second. Standard prefixes apply to watts as with oth ...

. Due to the very low water supply,

agriculture Agriculture encompasses crop and livestock production, aquaculture, and forestry for food and non-food products. Agriculture was a key factor in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created ...

is negligible, and only 4.5% of Turkmenistan's

arable land Arable land (from the , "able to be ploughed") is any land capable of being ploughed and used to grow crops.''Oxford English Dictionary'', "arable, ''adj''. and ''n.''" Oxford University Press (Oxford), 2013. Alternatively, for the purposes of a ...

s are within the province. Off its Caspian shores, the Balkan Region includes the island of Ogurja Ada, the largest in the Caspian Sea.

Etymology

One conjecture holds that Balkan comes from ''Bal akan'' meaning “where the honey flows”, possibly relating to the locally rich petroleum sources. However, Atanyyazow explains,

This name is derived from the Balkan word meaning "mountain" in ancient Turkic languages (Khasanov, p. 47) - compare the Balkan mountains in Bulgaria. In the Turkic language, it is also used to mean "mountain", "mountain-top mountains" (1 Uretsko-Russian. Sl. M, 1931, p. 110). In the dictionaries of Budagovyts and Gadlovyts, it also occurs in the same sense. This ancient name, which existed in the early 11th century, is interpreted by local elders as "honey flowing"...

Demographic

Table of National composition of the population of Balkan region (2022)

Table:

Administrative subdivisions

Districts

Balkan Province (''Balkan welaýaty'') is subdivided into 6

districts A district is a type of administrative division that in some countries is managed by the local government. Across the world, areas known as "districts" vary greatly in size, spanning regions or counties, several municipalities, subdivisions ...

(''etrap'', plural ''etraplar''): This document is reproduced online at https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Districts_in_Turkmenistan. #

(previously Gazanjyk) # Esenguly (previously Hasan-Kuli) # Etrek (previously Gyzyletrek) # Gyzylarbat (from 1999 to 2022 called Serdar) # Magtymguly (previously Garry Gala) # Türkmenbaşy In addition, part of the city of Turkmenbashy is subdivided into a borough with district status and thus a presidentially appointed mayor. * City Boroughs of Türkmenbaşy City: # Awaza etraby The former Kenar Borough (''Kenar etraby'') of the city of Turkmenbashy was abolished effective 9 November 2022.According to ''Türkmenistanyň dolandyryş-çäk birlikleriniň Sanawy'' Turkmenbashy until November 2022 was divided into the city of Turkmenbashy proper and the Awaza borough, which consists of the Awaza National Resort Zone plus an administrative center and bedroom community a short distance away as well as the city airport. However, parliamentary and presidential decrees established Kenar borough (''Kenar etraby'') and that name is attested in these statutes, though it was omitted from the official list of administrative subdivisions. The portion of the city of Turkmenbashy not in Awaza borough was thus referred to as the Kenar borough (''Kenar etraby''), after the former village of Kenar that was annexed by Turkmenbashy city.

Municipalities

As of January 1, 2017, the province included 10 cities (города or ''şäherler''), 13 towns (посёлки or ''şäherçeler''), 33 rural or village councils (сельские советы or ''geňeşlikler''), and 112 villages (села, сельские населенные пункты or ''obalar''). Two cities, Gumdag and Hazar, were downgraded to town status in November 2022, reducing the number of cities to eight and increasing the number of towns by two. The town of Garagöl was annexed by the town of Hazar, bringing the number of towns to 14. In the list below, cities with "district status" are bolded: :* Balkanabat (formerly Nebit-Dag) :*

(formerly Gazanjyk ( )) :* Esenguly (formerly Hasan Kuli) ( ) :* Etrek (formerly Gyzyletrek) :* Garabogaz (formerly Bekdaş) :* Gyzylarbat (from 1999 to 2022 called Serdar) :* Magtymguly (formerly Garrygala) ( ) :* Türkmenbaşy City (formerly Krasnovodsk)

Industry

From 2017 to 2019, Balkan Province produced these volumes of industrial products: Turkmenistan's largest petroleum refinery is in the city of Turkmenbashy ''(viz.)''. The Balkan Cement Plant in Jebel was built in 2011 by Turkish firm Polimeks and has a design capacity of one million tons per year. The Kiyanly Polymer Factory (), inaugurated October 17, 2018, features design capacity to produce 381 thousand tonnes of polyethylene and 81 thousand tonnes of

polypropylene Polypropylene (PP), also known as polypropene, is a thermoplastic polymer used in a wide variety of applications. It is produced via chain-growth polymerization from the monomer Propene, propylene. Polypropylene belongs to the group of polyolefin ...

per year. Built at a cost of $3.4 billion by LG International, Hyundai Engineering, Toyo Engineering, and Gap Inşaat (a subsidiary of

Çalık Holding Çalık Holding is a Turkish company that has been operating in the energy, construction, mining, textile, and finance sectors since the 1980s. Founder and chairman Ahmet Çalık began his business career in the textile industry, founding Orta D ...

), the plant cracks methane and ethane for production of polymers. In the first ten months of 2019, however, the factory produced only 67,900 tonnes of polyethylene and 12,700 tonnes of polypropylene. The $1.3 billion Garabogaz urea (carbamide) plant, built by

Mitsubishi Heavy Industries is a Japanese Multinational corporation, multinational engineering, electrical equipment and electronics corporation headquartered in Tokyo, Japan. MHI is one of the core companies of the Mitsubishi Group and its automobile division is the prede ...

and GAP İnşaat, was inaugurated on September 18, 2018, with a design capacity of 1.16 million tonnes of urea per year. Between January and October 2019, the Garabogaz plant produced approximately 392,000 tonnes of urea, of which 261,000 tonnes was exported. Three factories produce

iodine Iodine is a chemical element; it has symbol I and atomic number 53. The heaviest of the stable halogens, it exists at standard conditions as a semi-lustrous, non-metallic solid that melts to form a deep violet liquid at , and boils to a vi ...

in Turkmenistan, all in Balkan Province: one each in Balkanabat, Hazar, and

. The Bereket plant is designed to produce 150 tonnes per year of iodine. Following planned renovations and upgrades, the Balkanabat and Hazar plants will have design capacities of 250 tonnes and 300 tonnes of iodine, respectively, plus 2400 tonnes and 4500 tonnes of

bromine Bromine is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol, symbol Br and atomic number 35. It is a volatile red-brown liquid at room temperature that evaporates readily to form a similarly coloured vapour. Its properties are intermediate between th ...

, respectively, per year. Total production of iodine in 2019 was 681.4 tonnes.

Transportation

The M37 highway begins at the Turkmenbashi International Seaport and leads eastward 1200 kilometers in the direction of

Ashgabat Ashgabat (Turkmen language, Turkmen: ''Aşgabat'') is the capital city, capital and largest city of Turkmenistan. It lies between the Karakum Desert and the Kopet Dag, Kopetdag mountain range in Central Asia, approximately 50 km (30 ...

, Mary,

Türkmenabat Türkmenabat (), formerly Amul, Cärjew/Chardzhou (until 1924 and from 1940-1999), and Novy Chardzhuy (from 1927-1940), is the second-largest city in Turkmenistan and the administrative centre of Lebap Province. , it had a population of approxima ...

, and the border with

. A network of paved roads connects major population centers, including the P-15, P-16, P-17, P-18, and P-20 highways. Passenger and car ferry service is available between the seaport in Turkmenbashy and

Baku Baku (, ; ) is the Capital city, capital and List of cities in Azerbaijan, largest city of Azerbaijan, as well as the largest city on the Caspian Sea and in the Caucasus region. Baku is below sea level, which makes it the List of capital ci ...

. A major airport is located in Turkmenbashy, and smaller airports are located in Balkanabat, Etrek, Garabogaz, Hazar, and Jebel. A military airfield is located at Ýangyja. The

Trans-Caspian Railway The Trans-Caspian Railway (also called the Central Asian Railway, ) is a railway that follows the path of the Silk Road through much of western Central Asia. It was built by the Russian Empire during its expansion into Central Asia in the 19t ...

begins in Turkmenbashy and extends eastward to Uzbekistan via Ashgabat, Mary, and Turkmenabat. The International North–South Transport Corridor passes through Balkan Province and intersects the Trans-Caspian Railway at

, which features a large locomotive depot and repair works. In addition to the seaport at Turkmenbashy, smaller vessel-loading facilities are found at Garabogaz (urea) and Gyýanly (polymers). Turkmenbashi International Seaport operates oil-loading terminals at Alaja, Ekerem, and Kenar, and Dragon Oil loads oil at the port of Hazar.

References

Links

Tourism in Balkan Province
{{Authority control Regions of Turkmenistan