Governors pledge to lead eradication efforts, a nation will boost efforts to destroy its own biggest cash crop.
(KABUL, Afghanistan) - The accelerating program in Afghanistan to slash and burn the country's opium poppy fields shifted gears over the weekend, as governors from the highest poppy growing provinces in Afghanistan came to Kabul Saturday to finalize eradication plans. The political officials are working with the country's Ministries of Interior and Counter Narcotics.
Courtesy: ArabNews.comDr. Takkal Abdurrahimzai with Afghanistan's Ministry of Counter Narcotics, says they are serious about the eradication program. The United Nations estimated that cultivation and production had risen 59% in 2006, to 407,000 acres, or 1,650 kilometers. They estimated the yield to be 6,100 tons of opium, which is 92% of the world's supply.
Abdurrahimzai said they commit to carrying out more effective eradication than last year in their relevant provinces.
The value of the resulting heroin was estimated at $3.5 billion. Afghan farmers received about $700 million in revenue according to estimates. The Taliban are said to have collected anywhere between tens of millions, to $140 million in taxes from the crops.
The sad truth is that in this dirt poor nation where George W. Bush canceled the Afghan Children's Fund in 2005, this illegal crop can be up to ten times more profitable than wheat.
Courtesy: DoDPeople in Afghanistan will tell you that the opium production will never be halted, but officials like the Acting Minister of Counter Narcotics H.E General Khudaidad, say otherwise.
"The Eradication is part of the overall strategy to fulfill the long term elimination of illegal opium poppy, alongside interdiction efforts, a focus on reducing demand and strengthening institutions. There is also ongoing substantial investment in rural development, helping to create more opportunities for all Afghans, including poppy farmers."
2007 saw much discussion about this subject both in Afghanistan and here in the U.S. Many of us perceive opium to be an old industry in this part of the world and that is true, and it is also true that nothing there today generates more in terms of financial profit.
The cultivation of opium poppies for food, anesthesia, and ritual purposes dates back to at least the Neolithic Age, and opium is referenced in the most important medical texts of the ancient world.
What many of us don't know is that this has not always been the country's big agricultural product. Prior to Afghanistan's three decades of strife through war, grapes were one of their main crops.
In 2007, there was a 17% rise in overall cultivation over the year before, the government has promised to step up its efforts in 2008, according to the Minister of Interior, H.E Zarar Ahmad Muqbil, who stressed that "The government is expanding its capacity for eradication, alongside law enforcement efforts, to fight the opium industry which is destroying this country."
This New Zealand Army photo shows confiscated opium burning in Afghanistan. Thegovernment says they are going to substantially increase eradication efforts in 2008.But at the weekend meeting the government stressed that eradication would mainly be the responsibility of the governors, with support from the Afghan Eradication Force in selected provinces.
General Khudaidad added, "The government will continually monitor the progress of eradication around the country, through the use of advanced technology, and on the ground verification. We will react to situations as they occur."
In this campaign, farmers will be warned that eradication takes place, and they risked losing their investment if they did not plant legal crops.
Dr. Abdurrahimzai says warnings were also given to the gathered group of political officials representing the various provinces, "that if there is evidence that officials have been involved in bribery or corruption related to eradication, they would be dismissed from their jobs and prosecuted."
The Ministry of Interior has sacked some officials in different provinces, for failing to support the campaign to prevent farmers planting poppy, he said.
"Today, governors from around the country committed themselves to carrying out eradication, as an essential element in Afghanistan’s battle against opium poppy."
Helping Afghan farmers
Mr. Jelani Popal, Director General of the Independent Directorate for Local Administration/Governance, emphasized strengthening the Governors’ offices as an integral part of Provincial Approach, which he says will help them coordinate all external technical and financial interventions, in a more accountable way, under the direction of the IDLG.
While stressing the significance of the role to be played by governors in bringing about accountable and transparent governance mechanisms at sub national level, Mr. Popal says his agency, "is working on introducing policies that will put governors in the center of government in the provinces and enhance their capacity to deliver services. This will also help the Counter Narcotics initiatives including eradication to realize more successfully."
He added that, "local level dialogs will be held to understand what is necessary to shift farmers away from poppy and provide them with alternative sources of livelihood."
The Afghan Ministers say there will be no compensation to farmers who have their fields eradicated, and all poppy fields could legally be eradicated in the coming months. It sounds like an extremely ambitious plan, one which may carry all the success of the U.S. War on Drugs, which has turned out to be a miserable failure according to most statistics.
Opium poppy cultivation is illegal under Afghan law, through a Presidential decree, the Constitution, the Counter Narcotics Law and a Fatwa of the Ulema of Afghanistan. Afghan National Police told me that when they are in contact with a criminal, there are no jails or court systems in Kabul to try the case, so it is hard in some ways to imagine what will actually happen to farmers and public officials for that matter, who are caught breaking Afghanistan's opium laws.
Grapes of War
Vanity Fair reported a few important facts from Afghanistan in a November 2004 article. If you go back to the pre-Soviet invasion years of the 1970's and even for a short time after that, the country's main export was grapes and raisins.
It was a vineyard culture, something that is so hard for any American to imagine who knows the place today. But as I learned while spending most of the winter of 2006/07 covering the war in Afghanistan, there is not a sign left of that industry, at least not in the parts of the country I visited.
You see, the Soviets didn't just kill a million Afghan people; they poisoned water systems and wrought havoc on these people that is unimaginable by western military standards. This nation has never recovered from that destruction that was followed by the Taliban occupation and the following U.S. military strikes and war.
But the United States troops are not hated there, and perhaps there is a chance that this diverse and culturally rich country will regain the ability to grow grapes and other legal commodities.
I mentioned earlier in the article that the President canceled the Fund for Afghan Children in 2005. This is exactly the opposite of what it will take to adequately support these people that our soldiers greatly depend on as they wage war on Anti-Coalition militia.
I spent time with a Lieutenant named Dan Hewerdine who was stationed at Camp Joyce in the Kunar Province. He said this about how closely our soldiers work with the Afghan National Army, "Not only do we fight side by side, we're friends. Not only are we soldiers beside each other, not only have we been in combat together, we may be from a thousand miles away but in our hearts we're the same people."
So now the U.S. government's ambitions are being realized as Afghanistan steps up efforts to greatly reduce the cultivation of opium poppies. But the Vanity Fair reporter saw a different side of this effort, one that will cause more friction than before.
"An Afghan who was optimistic enough to plant a vine today could expect to wait five years before seeing any return for it, whereas a quick planting of poppies will see pods flourishing in six months. What would you do, if your family or your village were on a knife-edge? The American officers I met, tasked with repressing this cultivation, were to a man convinced that they were wasting their time and abusing the welcome they had at first received in the countryside. It doesn't take much intelligence to understand the history of Prohibition, or to know that American consumer demand is strong enough to overcome any attempt to inhibit supply."
What needs to happen
It is a hard call. Other efforts to aid Afghanistan seem to get far less attention than the destruction of the opium fields and the punishments that await those who violate the law. Perhaps if our government wakes up it will institute more programs to help these hungry and cold people whose country has been at war for almost thirty straight years.
We have a plan on the table at Salem-News.com to help direct resources to the children of Kabul, the nation's capitol, and beyond. There are parts of Afghanistan where people are living a reasonable life. I saw examples of this where there were U.S. military troops stationed nearby, and places where they weren't. It wasn't Kabul though, or a muddy place in this war torn country called Bagram. These are places that suffer bitter cold all winter and children travel the streets without adequate shoes. Until we as a nation help in these areas, there is no way the problems will go away. Getting rid of the opium will be great for Afghanistan in an ideal sense, but in reality it will probably mean more starving people willing to possibly turn to other illegal activity to make up for the lost revenue.
Look for future updates on that as well as a tentative plan to produce a documentary on the plight of Afghanistan's women and children from material I recorded last winter.
If you have ideas or ambitions about helping the people where our military is located, please send me an email at the address below or leave a comment.
The 14 Governors participating in the talks are from Hilmand, Kandahar, Urozgan, Nimroz, Nangarhar, Farah, Badakhshan, Badghis, Sar-i-pul, Laghaman, Kunar, Herata, Baghlan and Kabul Provinces.
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Tim King is a former U.S. Marine with almost twenty years experience on the west coast as a television news producer, photojournalist and reporter. Today, in addition to his role as a war correspondent in Afghanistan where he spent the winter of 2006/07, this Los Angeles native serves as Salem-News.com's Executive News Editor. Salem-News.com is the nation's only truly independent high traffic news Website, affiliated only with Google News. You can send Tim an email at this address: newsroom@salem-news.com
The Demise of Afghanistan's Poppy FieldsSalem-News.com