Diversify

As the US withdraws troops from Afghanistan, nonprofits will be left behind, trying to monitor and protect human rights. Using threats or rumors, some conservatives who reject women's rights will try to chase off these nonprofit organizations. 

One dilemma for Afghans is the reliance on opium as a crop. The country is the world's major supplier and for some communities it's an economic staple. Community leaders worry about the loss of a major crop and also detest the complications, especially addiction, that come with growing opium.

The illegal crop provides little in the way of stability or economic certainty, not with foreign and Afghan troops working to destroy the fields. The loss of a harvest can lead to debt for families and early and inappropriate marriages for daughters - which are closer to trafficking than a partnership for starting families - explains Emily Simons for The International.

The International Organization for Migration monitors and issues reports trafficking, debt marriage and other issues of migration.

Sources for Simons suggest that "Afghan policymakers have yet to find a solution that will protect farmers' families while also trying to end the opium trade."

Neighboring countries can help by reducing subsidies on their own agricultural products and encouraging Afghanistan to diversify its harvests - growing pomegranates, saffron, wheat and more. The neighboring countries an than purchase the surplus legal crops produced by Afghan farmers, helping families and their daughters. 

fghan policymakers have yet to find a solution that will protect farmers’ families while also trying to end the opium trade. - See more at: http://www.theinternational.org/articles/340-afghan-opium-brides#sthash.OWPhqutG.dpuf

In its 2008 trafficking report on Afghanistan, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) observed how deeply the practice of “debt marriage” is ingrained into Afghan society. According to the report, the practice of using women and girls for dispute settlements has been a part of Afghan society for centuries. - See more at: http://www.theinternational.org/articles/340-afghan-opium-brides#sthash.OWPhqutG.dpuf

In its 2008 trafficking report on Afghanistan, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) observed how deeply the practice of “debt marriage” is ingrained into Afghan society. According to the report, the practice of using women and girls for dispute settlements has been a part of Afghan society for centuries. - See more at: http://www.theinternational.org/articles/340-afghan-opium-brides#sthash.OWPhqutG.dpuf

In its 2008 trafficking report on Afghanistan, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) observed how deeply the practice of “debt marriage” is ingrained into Afghan society. According to the report, the practice of using women and girls for dispute settlements has been a part of Afghan society for centuries. - See more at: http://www.theinternational.org/articles/340-afghan-opium-brides#sthash.OWPhqutG.dpuf

Those who profit from opium and the old ways will resist new crops.

Another provincial reconstruction team project: With potatoes becoming  major cash crop, a father and son farm tend to the root vegetables in Bamyan Province. Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons and the US Army.

Slowdown

Interest in infrastructure development for distant lands comes and goes, relying on the political, economic and security interests of not just one country, but two and sometimes more. 

The US Agency for International Aid has decided against completing a $266 dam project on the Helmand River, reports Rajiv Chandrasekaran for the Washington Post.

"The dam is one of many reconstruction projects, once deemed essential, that are being scaled back rapidly and redesigned in the waning days of America’s long war in Afghanistan as troop reductions, declining budgets and public fatigue force a realignment of priorities," Chandrasekaran writes.

USAID will pay for installation, but will give the money to an Afghan electricity company rather than a US contractor. Afghans will provide security, as requested by Afghan President Hamid Karzai.  Many question if the dam will eventually supply more reliable electricity to Kandahar.

USAID has described how a convoy of 4,000 coalition troops spent a week fighting insurgents to allow delivery of a turbine to the Kajaki Dam in 2008. Three years later the turbine was still not installed, according to a report by Zainullah Stanikzai for Pajhwok Afghan News.

Economic development in the country depends on security. Responsibility for security, as well as success or failure of the dam project, now rests with the Afghan government. 

Photo courtesy of Wikimeda Commons and the US Army Corps of Engineers

Fertility

Following a trend evident throughout Asia and around the globe, Afghanistan has seen its fertility rate drop. "The average number of children Afghan women can expect to have in their lifetime fell from 8 in the 1990s to 6.3 in the mid-2000s and to 5.1 at the end of the decade," suggests a USA TODAY analysis of the country's birth data.

New emphasis on health care and education have contributed to the decline in the birthrate. The country's infant mortality rates have also plunged. 

Photo of Afghan baby delivered by Caesarean section, courtesy of  DVIDSHUB and Wikimedia Commons.

Invisible

Women are not shown in Afghanistan's elementary school textbooks.

"An accurate representation of successful women presents children with the realistic message that no country can progress if half its population is invisible in the social, economical and political scene," writes Noorjahan Akbar for UN Dispatach. "If we want to change gender roles in Afghanistan, a good place to start is with the textbooks."
 
Afghanistan has enough troublemakers who do not want gender roles to change - or at least they expect  women to work and get no credit for what they do. 

Even Dari books for children produced outside Afghanistan are sparse on images. Still, the children are eager to learn.

Photo of Afghan National Police offer distributing coloring books, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons and US Marine Corps.





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Even though women make up nearly 50% of agricultural workers in Afghanistan, according to the drawings in these books, farming, too, is exclusive to men. - See more at: http://www.undispatch.com/afghanistans-pedagogy-of-the-invisible#sthash.ggR8pJox.dpuf

Even though women make up nearly 50% of agricultural workers in Afghanistan, according to the drawings in these books, farming, too, is exclusive to men. - See more at: http://www.undispatch.com/afghanistans-pedagogy-of-the-invisible#sthash.ggR8pJox.dpuf

Even though women make up nearly 50% of agricultural workers in Afghanistan, according to the drawings in these books, farming, too, is exclusive to men. - See more at: http://www.undispatch.com/afghanistans-pedagogy-of-the-invisible#sthash.ggR8pJox.dpuf

Helmand PRT

The Provincial Reconstruction Team described in Fear of Beauty is a small subset of the overall Helmand team. The novel describes a US agriculture group, whose security members also have another mission in the remote area around fictional Laashekoh.

The actual and overall Helmand PRT is a complex organization, civilian-led, with 160 staff members. The PRT is led by the United Kingdom, a multinational effort of the US, Denmark and Estonia.

The PRT, which for years has dispatched teams around the province, describes its goals:

"Success in Helmand, where the insurgency and drugs trade interact to create particular challenges, is essential for a peaceful and stable Afghanistan. Why we do it It is vital that Afghanistan becomes a stable and secure state that is able to suppress violent extremism within its borders. We cannot allow Afghanistan to again become a safe haven for terrorists." 

Fear of Beauty provides but a small snapshot and a few insights into the PRT work. Progress has been made. For example, Mercy Corps has trained 50,000 people in improved farming techniques.

Is the story of Fear of Beauty improbable? Not according to some US veterans and Afghan refugees. 



Photo of Helmand River, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons and US military.

Interview

Great questions from Jordan Rich of CBS Boston, WBZ 1030 - about Afghanistan, the troops returning home and their accomplishments, and women's rights.

Note: I was thrown off by the first question, "Why did you go there?" Of course, he meant why did I choose to write about Afghanistan - a long story that includes a list of many chance encounters. Before our call, he had already asked if I had actually traveled there and he knew the answer was no.

First step

For those who think that the imagined village of Laashekoh cannot be real, consider this description from Jennifer Glasse of Al Jazeera:

"Saira Shakeeb Sadat wants her district, Khwaja Dukoh, to change. Surrounded by mud walls, the dusty hamlet in the remote northern Afghan province of Jawzjan is home to about 5,000 families. The isolation means security is good here, but little aid has reached the town....

"'There are a lot of limitations for working women everywhere in the world but especially in Afghanistan, where there are cultural restrictions,' she says. 'The only thing I have learned from the limitations of women in our society, is that if we have a goal and have self-confidence, we can get things done and fight those limitations...'  She believes that one of the key steps in battling those confines is education."
 
The women of Afghanistan are strong and ready to work on improving their communities.

Photo of Afghans building school in Herat, courtesy of  the US Agency for International Development and Wikimedia Commons.