Turkish Green Crescent hosts int’l event to tackle addiction

ANKARA

Authorities initiated a three-day program to strengthen global cooperation in the fight against addiction on April 30 at the Turkish Green Crescent Society’s headquarters in Istanbul.

The 8th International Capacity Building Program was organized by the International Federation of Green Crescent (IFGC), an umbrella organization for Country Green Crescents founded under the leadership of Türkiye’s Green Crescent.

The program, continuing through today, brought together around 120 participants from 60 countries.

Over the first two days, representatives from various global organizations collaborated to develop a joint strategy on addiction prevention.

On the first day of the event, Mehmet Dinç, president of the Turkish Green Crescent Society, noted a rise in both chemical and behavioral addictions.

"Along with Green Crescents in countries that share our mission, we must extinguish this global crisis," he said. "We lose more [lives] to addiction each year than to wars."

The UNODC's World Drug Report in 2024, based on 2022 data, reveals that 292 million people worldwide used drugs in 2022, a 20 percent increase over the past decade.

Esbjorn Hornberg, executive director of Movendi International and chair of the Istanbul Initiative, emphasized the role of cooperation in the sustainable prevention of addictions worldwide.

The IFGC, founded in 2016 and based in Istanbul, gathers 97 Country Green Crescents under one umbrella to combat addictions worldwide.

Established in 1920, the Turkish Green Crescent is a non-governmental organization that aims to empower youth and adults with factual information about drugs.