Afghanistan Analysts Network – English

Economy, Development, Environment

This priority area covers Afghanistan’s political economy, economic development and poverty, with a focus on sectors with important political and/or rule of law implications, such as mining, banking and transport and, in the past, the private security sector.

How Neglect and Remoteness Bred Insurgency and a Poppy Boom: The story of Badghis

Jelena Bjelica •

Badghis, a far-flung province in the west of the country, was the bad surprise in the 2016 Afghanistan Opium Survey of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime. The poppy cultivation area in Badghis increased almost by 200 percent compared to 2015, contributing significantly to the overall countrywide increase of ten per cent. AAN’s Jelena […]

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KABUL, Aug 15, 2015: A view of a large shop which sells items wholesale in Mandawi market in Kabul. Photo: PAJHWOK/Bais

Afghanistan’s Government Revenue: Continuing robust growth in the face of economic weakness

Bill Byrd • M Khalid Payenda •

The Afghan government has continued to increase the amount it collects in revenue – by 22 per cent last year and 33 per cent in the first six months of this year. This revenue growth well exceeded expectations and projections. Thirty-seven per cent of the total revenue increase in the first half of 2016 was […]

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The TUTAP kerosene lamp memorial in the centre of Bamyan. Photo: Jelena Bjelica.

Power to the People (3): Perspectives from Bamyan

Jelena Bjelica • Thomas Ruttig •

The TUTAP commission established by President Ghani following massive protests recently decided in favour of the Salang route for a north-south power line. The commission ruled further that Bamyan should get its own 220KV power line by 2019. This is a balanced solution in the midst of crisis, meant to temper ethnic tensions that arose […]

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Power transmission line in Balkh province. Photo: Jelena Bjelica (2011).

Power to the People (2): The TUTAP protests

Thomas Ruttig •

When protesters interrupted President Ashraf Ghani’s speech in London three times on 13 May 2016, the heated controversy surrounding the route of TUTAP, a main electricity grid initiative, received even international attention. In Afghanistan, the tensions have been simmering since January 2016 when Hazara members of the government started trying to prevent a potential rerouting of […]

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Samples of methamphetamine and other synthetic drugs, like ecstasy and MDMA, exhibited in the display cabinet of state-of-the-art CNPA forensics lab in Kabul, Afghanistan (Photo by Jelena Bjelica 2015)

Afghanistan Breaking Bad: Crystal meth, a new drug on the market

Jelena Bjelica •

The first methamphetamine seizure in Afghanistan was recorded in 2008, a minor capture of four grams in Helmand province. Now, seven years later, some 17 kilograms of methamphetamine, popularly known as ‘crystal meth’, were seized in the first ten months of 2015, in 14 out of Afghanistan’s 34 provinces. The Ministry of Counter Narcotics warned […]

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Before the Paris Conference: The state of Afghanistan’s climate and its adaption capability

Thomas Ruttig • Ryskeldi Satke •

Climate change is already having a severe impact on Afghans’ daily lives – but this challenge is often over-shadowed by what seem to be more-urgent problems: war and the economic crisis. Therefore, the reports submitted by the Afghan government for the Paris climate conference starting today, 30 November 2015 (and President Ashraf Ghani speaking in […]

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Caption: Convicted Kabul Bank shareholder Khalil Ferozi is treated as a guest of honor during the 4 November 2014 stone-laying ceremony for Kabul's Smart City, where he signs an MoU with the ministry of urban development. Source: ministry of urban development.

The Afghan Government and th­e ‘Smart City’ Debacle: Who out-smarted whom?

Martine van Bijlert •

The Afghan government, much to its chagrin, has found itself embroiled in a controversy that has direct links to the 2010 Kabul Bank scandal. On 4 November 2015, a small group of high-level government officials presided over the stone-laying ceremony of a new and ambitious township called Smart City. What was meant as a good […]

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Poppy field in Helmand. Photo: AAN Staff

“One Year’s Result is Not a Trend”: the 2015 opium cultivation decrease

Jelena Bjelica •

The decline (by almost a fifth) in the area of land in Afghanistan planted with opium poppy in 2015 came as a surprise to many. Poppy cultivation in Afghanistan had been on the rise since 2010, when an opium poppy blight halved opium production and triggered a subsequent hike in opium prices. However, the decline […]

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Economic Management in Afghanistan: Thoughts on what worked, what didn’t and why

AAN •

The Afghan government and its international partners will meet in Kabul next month at the Senior Officials Meeting (SOM) to review progress since last December’s London Conference and to discuss specific reform programs for the future. Discussions are complicated by the fact that Afghanistan’s economy remains weak and its fiscal situation dire. In the deliberations on […]

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Too Few, Badly Paid And Unmotivated: The teacher crisis and the quality of education in Afghanistan

Qayoom Suroush • Christine Roehrs •

The progress in the education sector has been reported widely as one of the success stories of the national international efforts in Afghanistan since 2002. However, this narrative omits severe problems – one is that the teachers who are supposed to facilitate the rapid growth of the sector are still often ill-trained, ill-equipped, badly paid, […]

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Protecting Beauty: Shah Foladi – a new conservation area for Afghanistan

Kate Clark •

Afghanistan has a new protected conservation area – the Shah Foladi: 2,700 square kilometres on the north side of the Koh-e Baba range of the Hindu Kush in Bamyan province. This mix of irrigated valleys, upland rangeland and high peaks is important for wildlife (270 species of birds, including many seasonal migrants, and many flowering […]

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Library in Kabul. Photo: Qayoom Suroush

Reading in Kabul: The state of Afghan libraries

Qayoom Suroush •

With Afghanistan’s educated class growing rapidly over the past decade while education resources remain scarce, there is an increasing need for a functioning public library system, AAN’s Qayoom Suroush argues. However, the only public library of Afghanistan’s capital – at the same time standing in for a non-existent national library – is not even close […]

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