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Economic opportunities for poor farmers' key to opium fight

06 Feb '08
3 min read

Today, production is increasingly concentrated in five southern provinces where the security situation is most acute. This makes it vital that alternatives to opium address the problems of these vulnerable rural farmers by supporting their access to land, credit, food security, and sustainable economic livelihoods.

The report suggests a development effort over several years which will put in place a critical mass of infrastructure, markets, and services that can spur sustainable growth. It is also essential, the report argues, to ensure security and support better governance and effective grassroots institutions. This will strengthen the relationship of responsibility and trust between rural people and their local and central government.

With these conditions in place, experience shows that reductions in opium poppy cultivation can be achieved. For exa mple, in those parts of Badakhshan province where households are in close proximity to urban areas, with access to both agricultural commodity and labor markets, reductions in opium poppy cultivation have been achieved in a relatively short time.

The report underlines the importance of security and good governance. “Legal livelihoods can only be sustained under conditions of decent governance and security that allow the development of licit markets, the accumulation of assets, and the growth of normal economic activities,” said Alastair Mckechnie, World Bank Country Director for Afghanistan. “A strong institutional framework needs to be built, based on the promising community institutions already set up by efforts like the National Solidarity Program.”

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