Experts warn that excessive groundwater extraction for agriculture has brought the phenomenon dangerously close, just 10 meters from Naqsh-e Rostam, the burial site of Achaemenid kings, and 300 meters from Persepolis.
In a conference on climate change and cultural heritage held at the Research Institute of Cultural Heritage and Tourism, Dr. Mehdi Zare, a leading seismologist, highlighted the severity of the crisis in Fars Province.
He noted that subsidence in the Marvdasht plain now reaches 20-30 cm annually due to unsustainable farming practices, including water-intensive rice and corn cultivation.
Officials also expressed concern about Tehran, where subsidence has caused ground levels to drop by up to 12 meters in some areas over recent decades, raising the risk of triggering nearby fault lines.
According to Masoumeh Amigh-Pey from the National Cartographic Center, more than 800 cities and 16 metropolises in Iran are affected. She emphasized the need for urgent groundwater regulation and proposed creating a nationwide atlas to identify high-risk heritage zones.
