Afghans wait for food assistance from the World Food Program in Kabul in October.
Claire Harbage / NPR
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Afghans wait for food assistance from the World Food Program in Kabul in October.
Claire Harbage / NPR
KABUL — Every few weeks, 50-year-old Mari Jaan and hundreds of other Afghans wait in long lines to buy groceries, where she waits for a few modest items: a jar of cooking oil, a bag of flour, beans lentils, salt.
Even after she collects this, her bag is still light – and her burden at home grows heavier.
“Electricity, water, all cut off,” said Mari Jaan. Her husband has been unemployed and sick for the past year. “Can’t pay the bills without him.”
But what really worries her is that winter is approaching.
“We’re not prepared. We don’t have coal, we don’t have firewood, and we certainly don’t have enough to eat,” she said, as she waited several hours outside the gate of a food distribution point. The center is operated by the World Food Program.
Women wait outside a distribution center where the World Food Program is providing food assistance in October.
Claire Harbage / NPR
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Claire Harbage / NPR
Women wait outside a distribution center where the World Food Program is providing food assistance in October.
Claire Harbage / NPR
When the Afghan government collapsed last year and the Taliban returned to power, it caused a major humanitarian crisis. Governments and donor organizations like the International Monetary Fund have cut their support, sending the country’s economy into a tailspin and leaving countless Afghans without jobs and income.
Today, more than 90% of Afghans do not have enough food to eat, according to WFP and Special Inspector General for Reconstruction of Afghanistan — and the hardships families endured last year feel insurmountable this year.
“When we talk to people at our distribution sites, people say to us, ‘Last winter was tough, but we don’t know how to get through the coming winter. ‘,” said Philippe Kropf, spokesman for the WFP in Kabul.
In Afghanistan, hunger strike is heaviest in winter
This week, the International Committee of the Red Cross report that cases of child malnutrition in their hospitals in Afghanistan are 90% higher this year than in 2021. The aid group also reported that a children’s hospital it supports in Kabul has seen the number of children under 5 years old increased by 55%. people being treated for pneumonia, as people try to keep their homes warm.
Some jobs, such as construction, are temporarily halted during the colder months, leaving Afghanistan’s day laborers without a steady income during that time.
Construction worker Shahzaman Mohammadi, 32, stands in line to receive food assistance.
Claire Harbage / NPR
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Construction worker Shahzaman Mohammadi, 32, stands in line to receive food assistance.
Claire Harbage / NPR
“Construction sites often freeze in the winter and so a lot of us have no jobs and no money during the winter months,” said 32-year-old Shahzaman Mohammadi. food stream.
The country’s harvest this year, particularly of wheat, was much lower than expected, partly due to a multi-year drought, but also to rising fuel and fertilizer costs. All of this means that many rural families may struggle to make it through the winter on subsistence farming alone. Aid may not be available to those communities and more remote villages, depending on weather and road conditions.
Precarious households, barely able to support themselves, may have to make the same difficult choice this year that they was forced to do in the end winter: spend the little money they have on food or buy coal and firewood to keep warm.
Kropf said aid organizations are also struggling this year.
Wheelbarrows loaded with oil, salt, flour and lentils at a WFP distribution center in Kabul.
Claire Harbage / NPR
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Wheelbarrows loaded with oil, salt, flour and lentils at a WFP distribution center in Kabul.
Claire Harbage / NPR
The WFP said they are in need of more than 1 billion USD additional funding to sustain its operations in Afghanistan through the winter. The war in Ukraine caused great damage spike in food and energy prices this year, it reports. of the aid group food basket about 20% more expensive than last year.
The changing face of hunger
In Kabul, it’s not uncommon to find former teachers, military members and even government employees waiting for cash or food aid.
“We are seeing a change in the face of hunger in Afghanistan,” said Kropf. “With job losses, with the economy in recession, we are now seeing people queuing for food assistance who would never believe in their lifetimes them, they will stand in line to receive aid.”
Khudai Nazar, 41, is among them.
For many years, he fixed flat tires for a living and was able to feed his family of nine. But that financial security ended soon after the government collapsed and he lost his job.
Khudai Nazar, 41, used to fix tires for a living and was able to feed his family of nine. But that financial security ended soon after the government collapsed and he lost his job.
Claire Harbage / NPR
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Claire Harbage / NPR
Khudai Nazar, 41, used to fix tires for a living and was able to feed his family of nine. But that financial security ended soon after the government collapsed and he lost his job.
Claire Harbage / NPR
“We had to cut back a lot to get enough,” Nazar said as he passed a food line. “We used to eat meat a few times a week; now we’re lucky if we can eat it a few times a month.”
He does not blame the new government for turning his life upside down. Very few people wait in line at the WFP distribution center. Instead, many see the international community at fault.
“Life was much better before the arrival of the Emirate,” Nazar said, referring to the Taliban government. “The sanctions imposed on this government have affected us all.”
While some of the Taliban’s leaders, now in government, have long faced international sanctions, the country and its institutions have not. The economic factors that have turned so many Afghans’ lives upside down have more to do with international recognition of the Taliban.
People flow through the courtyard of a food distribution center in Kabul in October.
Claire Harbage / NPR
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Claire Harbage / NPR
People flow through the courtyard of a food distribution center in Kabul in October.
Claire Harbage / NPR
The United States fought the Taliban in Peace negotiations under the Trump administration, but neither Washington nor any other country recognizes the Taliban as the legitimate government of Afghanistan. The United States and other countries have revoked the certificate of Afghanistan’s central bank, blocking the country’s access to the international banking system and the $9 billion it holds in foreign currency reserves.
The Biden administration has issued 3.5 billion dollars in total for critical humanitarian needs through the creation of a fund aimed at overcoming the Taliban. But governments and financial institutions remain apprehensive about resuming their own programmes.
After repeatedly declining NPR requests for interviews, the IMF spokesman’s office sent this statement: “Due to the continued lack of clarity by the international community regarding the recognition of a government in Afghanistan, the IMF has suspend engagement with Afghanistan.”
Against this backdrop, millions of Afghans and aid groups are preparing for a harsh winter.
“We were worried, we knew it would be difficult,” said Mohammadi, a construction worker. “Now it’s all in God’s hands.”
