U N I T E D   N A T I O N S
Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA)
Integrated Regional Information Network (IRIN)
AFGHANISTAN: FAO launches appeal for agricultural rehabilitation
30 November 2001


ISLAMABAD, 30 November (IRIN) - The UN Food and Agriculture Organisation
(FAO) appealed on Thursday for US $10.1 million to help resume immediate
emergency assistance to millions of Afghan farmers and nomads, severely
affected by drought and the ongoing conflict.

"Over the past three years, food production in Afghanistan has
significantly decreased," Dr Syed Gul Safi, a national officer with FAO,
told IRIN on Friday in Pakistan's capital, Islamabad. He added that with
the disruptions in commercial food supply and humanitarian assistance, it
was high time to launch a major emergency recovery effort targeting
farming communities.

The FAO estimates that some 85 percent of Afghanistan's 22 million people
were directly dependent on agriculture. The rural agricultural economy
needs to be revived so that it could support livelihood mechanisms of the
poverty stricken Afghans. "Rehabilitation should begin with the
agriculture sector," he saaid, adding that once Afghans were able to
sustain themselves they would be better able to contribute in rebuilding
their country.

FAO estimated that the wheat crop, which accounted for 80 percent of
Afghanistan's cereal production, had been devastated by war and drought.
"Drought has affected all crop production but the rain-fed areas in the
western and northern regions, which produced most of the cereal crops,
suffered the most," he said. Compounding problems in northern Afghanistan
had been the ongoing civil conflict, he added.

According to an FAO press statement on Thursday, some 100,000 displaced
people in the north would be provided with seeds, fertilisers and
machinery that would enable their reintegration into the rural economy.
This would start with the distribution of 15,000 mt of wheat seed to
farmers in northern Afghanistan targeting remote areas, it added.

Safi pointed out that nomads, who comprise eight to 11 percent of
Afghanistan's population, were largely dependent on livestock and thus
adversely affected by the drought. "The nomads need animal feed,
vaccination and other animal health services on a priority bases," he
said. Earlier, the FAO provided animal health services to Afghans through
a network of 220 veterinary field units, staffed by 650 workers. This
could be revived by providing services to some 100,000 nomads.

The statement went on to say that FAO planned to feed some 18,000 head of
cattle with 1,800 mt of animal feed to help 50,000 farmers and their
families in northern Afghanistan. It also intended to create a network of
farm machinery repair workshops.

Fruit trees and forestery, once a major foreign exchange source for
Afghanistan, were now in disarray, said Safi. He added that little had
been done to rehabilitate horticulture (small scale cultivation). "Forests
were systematically destroyed and I don't see any immediate efforts to
rehabilitate them," he maintained. The irrigation system that nourished
agricultural land has been ruined by wars.

The FAO statement added that it was planning to send international staff
into the capital, Kabul, in a few days. Many of its offices had been
looted and destroyed over the past few months, it said.


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