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2006 Afghanistan Drought

Participants in the CWS-supported Sustainable Water Resource Program. Irrigation sources, malnutrition and child mortality have reached critical levels as a result of the food and drinking water shortages. Photo: CWS-Pakistan/Afghanistan

October 19, 2006

Food and water shortages -- the result of chronic drought conditions over more than seven years -- are threatening livelihoods and health in northern, western, and central regions of Afghanistan. Rivers, wells, springs, and kareezes (water reservoirs) have either dried up or are drying, adversely affecting agriculture and livestock -- sources of sustainable income.

Further, vulnerable people are facing malnourishment as an expanding food deficit forces families to reduce the frequency of meals and make adjustments in their diets. The complex crisis in livelihood systems and food security along with a history of war, civil conflict, and migration has affected mental as well as physical health of the population.

Almost no harvest is expected on dried out rain-fed land and crops are failing on irrigated lands as well as water supplies diminish. A shortage of fodder and water for animals is imperiling livestock (chickens, goats, sheep, cattle). As a result, growers and livestock owners have little or no surpluses to generate income while prices of commodities - particularly staple food (wheat flow, rice, etc.) - are soaring.

Small and marginal farmers and share croppers who can't find land to rent along with households with children and/or headed by women or disabled, widowed, elderly, or very young persons are particularly vulnerable. Women who head households are among the most affected because they have mostly adopted animal husbandry as a major source of income.

Affected families have no reserved food or money for the coming winter. Farmers have no seed reserves for cultivation in the new year. Alternative job opportunities are scarce.

Emergency Appeal

Church World Service-Pakistan/Afghanistan (CWS-PIA) is coordinating an Action by Churches Together response with Christian Aid, another ACT implementing member in Afghanistan in the Hazarajat area -- one of the poorest regions of the country with some of the coldest, most mountainous, and least agriculturally productive land.

In implementing the program, CWS and Christian Aid will work with the local implementing partners - including the Cooperation Center for Afghanistan (CAA), a non-governmental, non-political, non-profit organization which seeks to promote and protect human rights as well as alleviate poverty among the Afghan people through long-term development.

Read more about the 2006 Afghanistan Drought Appeal.

Media Contact:
Lesley Crosson, CWS/New York, 212-870-2676;
Jan Dragin, 781-925-1526;

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