Waldman's assessment will reinforce what many Americans believe: that long years of struggle have put the Afghan people in a position of hopelessness. But when Waldman talks about the people he has met in the course of his work, what he emphasizes most is their strength and resilience.
"The Afghan people have a great strength; a dignity in their lives, and a pride in their culture....In many ways, I'm impressed by their determination to make the best of the situations they live in."
Waldman himself is British, a former foreign affairs advisor for the UK Parliament. He is in the midst of a whirlwind US trip to promote Falling Short, a report he wrote exposing the $15 billion international aid shortfall in Afghanistan.
He looks a little weary, but speaks calmly and assuredly about leading a team of Oxfam policy and advocacy specialists who work both in the capital city of Kabul and in rural areas of Afghanistan. Their job: to listen to people's concerns, conduct research, and advocate for change at the national and international level.
In the mountain provinces of Badakhshan and Daikundi, Waldman and his team visited families who survive long, harsh winters on a diet of mainly dried bread and tea; communities where the life expectancy hovers around 44 years old; places where children and pregnant women often die due to malnutrition and a lack of medical care.
In other regions, thousands of civilians have fallen victim to acts of violence by militants and criminal groups. Oxfam and local NGOs are implementing peace-building programs to end violence at the local level.
Despite the obstacles, many Afghan people are determined to build a secure future for their country and their families. "I know of individuals working for human rights, who have been subject to considerable pressures, who nonetheless continue their fight," notes Waldman. "And ordinary Afghans who work long and hard to ensure their families are well kept and their children can attend school."
The US also plays a role in securing Afghanistan's future. "The US is by far the largest aid donor to Afghanistan," Waldman says. "Without US support, it is difficult to envisage Afghanistan achieving stability in the near future."
Right now, though, US support for Afghanistan is not living up to its promises. US military spending there far exceeds spending on aid—and the US has only delivered half of the $10.4 billion in aid it committed between 2002 and 2008. To achieve real change in Afghanistan, Waldman says, the US must increase funding for aid projects that lift people out of poverty.
And effective aid is about more than just dollar amounts. "The way aid is spent is crucial," says Waldman. "Right now, there are a number of ways aid is failing to maximize its potential."
To live up to this potential, the US needs to approach aid differently in Afghanistan:
It's essential, Waldman says, that local people are the owners and leaders of the aid projects that affect their lives. "Let's face it: nobody wants to feel that anything is imposed on them. Communities in the developing world are no different. In order to have a project that is really relevant to the lives of ordinary people living in difficult circumstances, you have to ensure that they are fully involved."
If we take these steps, Waldman says, we can build on the strength of the Afghan people and help bring peace after decades of conflict.
"I am cautiously optimistic," he says, "primarily because of the sheer resilience and determination of the Afghans to achieve peace and development. But there are no shortcuts, no quick deals that will lead to a lasting peace."
Even one event like this—and there are others including flash floods, shortages of fodder, drought—can have devastating consequences on the availability of food, especially for people who depend heavily on their animals and agriculture. Decades of conflict have prevented many of them from being able to strengthen or diversify their means of making a living.
It is harsh realities like these that a $250,000 Oxfam program has helped to remedy for 2,000 families in 40 villages scattered through the Daikundi and Bamiyan provinces. With high-quality seeds, some technical training, and a boost from a supply of fertilizer, families were able to grow a whole range of produce.
"This is the first time in my life that I have eaten these vegetables," said one 65-year-old resident of Jingan village, showing off a pumpkin plucked from a garden that also produced lettuce, cabbage, cauliflower, carrots, and tomatoes. "We now save money and have a better diet."
But the program has done more than just help people produce new harvests. It has planted the seeds for their future development, too. Literacy classes for women, construction of a pair of greenhouses, and training in animal breeding to improve local herds were also among the projects initiated in this remote region.
Though a great deal remains to be done before villages can wrench themselves free of crippling poverty, projects that help people improve their standard of living have fed the aspirations of many.
"I hope that one day I will be able to read and write and will know what is happening the world around us," said a young mother named Razia, who brings her one-year-old daughter to the literacy classes sponsored by Oxfam in the village of Gochan.
The literacy classes, held in 20 communities, have been so popular that villagers have asked Oxfam to offer them for men as well. For girls who have never had the opportunity to go to school, the classes give them the basics in reading and writing—with the hope that some students will be able to continue with their educations in nearby schools.
Education, in fact, is the basis for much of this rural development initiative—from villagers learning about new seeds to improved husbandry practices. The ultimate goal is to help make sure that food is more readily available for many of the people in these rugged communities. Families chosen to participate include those caring for handicapped children, ones headed by women, and households without land and little opportunity to earn an income. All told, about 14,000 people have indirectly benefitted from the program.
With basic diets of bread, tea, and only occasionally a bit of mutton, villagers showed particular interest in learning about vegetable gardening. In separate classes for men and women, participants learned how to cultivate an array of new seeds, how to fertilize the soil, and when to harvest the vegetables and process them, too.
But challenges remain. Adverse weather and limited water often add up to small harvests. And farmers need more training on sustainable approaches to agriculture, such as through the creation of seed banks.
The establishment of orchards—a new activity for many people—also sparked interest. Thirty farmers each received 100 saplings including walnuts, pears, apples, almonds, apricots, and peaches. And 10 farmers also got the tools needed to graft fruit trees to aid in the creation of new orchards. Courses offered farmers training on the establishment and management of nurseries and garden design.
Oxfam also provided training on animal breeding and livestock management. A total of 26 new calves were born under the program and 20,000 animals received vaccinations against a host of ills including parasites and liver worms.
"Given the multi-dimensional nature of poverty and the past decades of conflict and insecurity, the local communities still have a long way to go in establishing sustainable community structures, livelihoods and environmental protection," said a final report on the project.
What's the answer? Oxfam sees the need for a long-term commitment to these villages so that local people can become empowered to undertake development initiatives that would ensure greater food security for everyone.
]]>The report was released a day ahead of a NATO summit in Latvia to review progress in Afghanistan.
Girls are particularly losing out, with just one in five girls in primary education and one in 20 attending secondary school.
The report, entitled “Free, Quality Education for Every Afghan Child,” says that aid from rich countries is not being delivered, meaning millions of children are being denied an education.
Seven million Afghan children are currently out of school, while five million children attend school - up from 3.1 million in 2003 and around 1 million in 2001,when the Taliban were in power.
Many of those lucky enough to be in school are being taught by untrained teachers: a survey in northern Afghanistan revealed only five percent of primary school teachers could pass the exams that their pupils must take.
“Educating Afghanistan’s children is crucial in improving their lives and in the rebuilding and development of the country. But poverty, crippling fees, and huge distances to the nearest schools prevent parents from sending their children to school. Those children who are lucky enough to be in school must endure untrained teachers, inadequate school buildings, and poor textbooks. If Afghanistan is to meet its ambitious aims for primary and secondary education, there must be a dramatic increase in aid to the government from rich countries,” says Grace Ommer, head of Oxfam Great Britain in Afghanistan.
Oxfam’s report shows that extra investment in school buildings is desperately needed. More than half of pupils do not go to school because there is no school nearby. More than half of Afghanistan’s schools need major repairs, the majority are without clean drinking water or toilet facilities, and two million children study in tents or the open air. Oxfam calls on the international community to invest US$563 million to rebuild 7,800 schools across the country. Rich countries are not providing nearly enough aid to Afghanistan, despite their many promises. So far they contribute only $126 million a year.
Oxfam estimates Afghanistan needs nearly 53,000 trained primary school teachers immediately and a further 64,000 teachers in the next five years. There is also a distinct shortage of female teachers, as currently less than three in 10 teachers are female.
Recruiting these new teachers will be difficult given the low level of morale among Afghanistan’s existing teachers. Their pay is very poor: in Daikundi province in central Afghanistan, most teachers are only paid US$38 per month, and many teachers have to pay a bribe before they are given their salaries.
There are also up to 20,000 “ghost teachers” who collect their salaries but don’t go to work, or who collect more than one salary. Oxfam is calling for better budgeting systems, more consultation, and the creation of a national database of teachers to stamp out corruption in the education system.
Schools are supposed to be free, but in some areas up to 85 percent of schools charge fees. The average fee per student is $6 per year; the average Afghan income is only $293 per year.
To ensure that the Afghan government meets its Millennium Development Goals, Oxfam is calling for:
It is two years since the international community and Afghan government launched the ‘Afghanistan Compact’, in which donors pledged over $10bn of aid to the country. They resolved ‘to overcome the legacy of conflict’ by promoting development, security, governance, the rule of law and human rights.
It must now be acknowledged that many of the Compact’s targets are not being met, and that too many of the commitments made remain unfulfilled.
There has been undoubted social and economic progress in Afghanistan, but it has been slow and is being undermined by increasing insecurity.
Oxfam, which has had operations and supported partners in Afghanistan for nearly twenty years, wants world leaders to support a major change of direction in order to reduce suffering and avert a humanitarian disaster.
Oxfam believes there are five guiding principles which should underpin this change of course.
The international community has pledged $25 billion to Afghanistan since 2001 but has only delivered $15 billion. The US is the biggest donor to Afghanistan but also has one of the biggest shortfalls—according to the Afghan government between 2002 and 2008 the US only delivered half of its $10.4 billion commitment.
The same sources show that over this period the European Commission and Germany distributed less than two-thirds of their respective $1.7 and $1.2 billion commitments, and the World Bank has distributed just over half of its $1.6 billion commitment. The UK pledged $1.45 billion and distributed $1.3 billion.
"The reconstruction of Afghanistan requires a sustained and substantial commitment of aid—but donors have failed to meet their aid pledges to Afghanistan. Too much aid from rich countries is wasted, ineffective or uncoordinated,” said the report’s author Matt Waldman, Afghanistan policy advisor at international aid agency Oxfam. “Given the slow pace of progress in Afghanistan, and the links between poverty and conflict, the international community must urgently get its act together."
An estimated 40 percent of the money spent has returned to rich donor countries such as the US through corporate profits, consultant salaries and other costs, vastly pushing up expenditure. For example, a road between the center of Kabul and the international airport cost the US over $3.7 million per mile, at least four times the average cost of building a road in Afghanistan.
Around 90 percent of all public spending in Afghanistan comes from international aid, so the massive shortfall hinders efforts to rebuild infrastructure damaged by over two decades of war and to ensure the widespread delivery of essential services such as education and health.
The report says a level of donor under-spending can be expected because of the lack of Afghan government capacity, large-scale corruption and challenging security conditions. But the size of the shortfall highlights the importance of donors making concerted efforts to address these issues.
The report also shows that a disproportionate amount of aid follows the conflict and is being used for political and military objectives rather than reducing poverty.
"Spending on tackling poverty is a fraction of what is spent on military operations," continued Waldman. "While the US military is currently spending $100 million a day in Afghanistan, aid spent by all donors since 2001 is on average less than a tenth of that—just $7 million a day. This is a shortsighted policy. There must be strong support for development in the south but if other provinces are neglected then insecurity could spread."
Looking to the future of aid to Afghanistan, Waldman concluded: "The priority now is to increase the volume of aid and ensure it makes a sustainable difference for the poorest Afghans, especially in rural areas. Aid must address Afghan needs, build local capacities and help Afghans help themselves."
ACBAR's main recommendations are:
An Oxfam survey in six provinces across Afghanistan shows 50% of Afghans consider land and 43% consider water as major causes of disputes. Given the importance of family and tribal affiliations, and with arms widely available, these disagreements can easily escalate and flare into violence.
Oxfam's survey shows that while Afghans see the Taliban, warlords, and criminals as their biggest external threats, disagreements over resources are the main causes of insecurity in their daily lives.
Despite the evident importance of building peace at the local level, so far national and international responses to insecurity have focused on military efforts and on high-level or political initiatives rather than grassroots work.
"Existing high-level measures to promote peace in Afghanistan are not succeeding, says Matt Waldman, Oxfam International's policy adviser in Afghanistan. “This is not only due to the revival of the Taliban, but because insecurity often has local causes, such as disputes over land, water, and family concerns. In many cases these local disputes can turn violent and escalate into factional conflict."
"Whilst local disputes don't attract the same headlines as the Taliban, they cause insecurity, undermine quality of life, and hinder development efforts. Militants and criminal groups also exploit local conflicts and rivalries to strengthen their positions," according to Waldman.
Oxfam's research shows that to resolve disputes most Afghans turn to traditional community and tribal councils, known as shuras. Oxfam is calling for a national network of peace-building projects to work with local people, officials, and shuras to build their capacity to resolve disputes through techniques such as mediation, negotiation, and conflict resolution.
The projects also seek to develop trust and cohesion between families, communities, and tribes—the building blocks of Afghan society—and help them to improve their relationships with one another.
"Oxfam's research shows that Afghans most often turn to tribal or communal shuras to resolve local problems, but little has been done to help shuras resolve disputes fairly and effectively,” says Waldman. "Local peace building has had excellent results but benefits only a fraction of Afghans because it has received so little international support. The country urgently needs a nationwide network of peace-building projects. It is a long-neglected but essential part of achieving peace and stability in Afghanistan."
In the Oxfam survey of 500 people in six provinces, Afghans were asked what were the major cause of disputes:
(Note: respondents could give more than one cause.)
When asked which were the greatest threats to their security:
To resolve a dispute:
Some peace-building organizations have established "peace shuras" to promote more effective dispute resolution and to bring communities and factions together. In Farah province, a peace-building project helped to resolve a 25-year-old dispute that caused the deaths of eight people. Some peace-building projects have also ended forced marriages and the beating of women and children.
]]>Household contributions to education are steep and deter new entrants. Those in schools are faced with inadequate educational materials, textbooks, and teachers. Budget allocation and spending in the education sector by various stakeholders remain largely uncoordinated and opaque.
This briefing paper outlines some of the key concerns, and proposes a plan for not only increased funding, but also reforming budget allocation and planning within the Ministry of Education and amongst other actors in the education sector.
]]>The report card (for grades 1-9) recognizes that Afghanistan has made progress in enrollment, but finds key gaps in school completion rates, policy management, quality of education and available resources.
Despite the increase in school enrollment, more than half of Afghanistan's children don't attend primary school. Less than 34% of those enrolled are girls.
Drop-out rates are high, particularly among girls. Of those attending primary school, only 9% go on to secondary school.
Female teachers are scarce. In one province there is one female teacher for every 152 male teachers. Increasing the number of female teachers is essential to increase the enrollment of girls.
HRRAC recommends that international donors honor their commitments to provide sufficient and long-term funding for Afghanistan and ensure adequate steps are taken to increase the enrollment of girls and improve the quality of education.
The Human Rights Research and Advocacy Consortium is a group of Afghan and international organizations working in the fields of humanitarian relief, reconstruction, human and women's rights, peace promotion, research, and advocacy. It was established in early 2003 to engage in proactive research and advocacy on human rights issues over a sustained period.
Consortium Members
Afghan organizations
Afghan Development Association
Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission
Agency Coordinating Body for Afghan Relief (advisory organization)
Agency for Rehabilitation and Energy-conservation in Afghanistan
Afghanistan Research and Evaluation Unit (advisory organization)
Coordination of Humanitarian Assistance
Cooperation for Peace and Unity
International organizations
Oxfam International
Mercy Corps
Ockenden International
CARE International
Rights and Democracy
Save the Children Federation, Inc.
When's the last time a small-farm family called it quits and had to sell their land for development? Probably yesterday or the day before.
There's no coincidence here. The loss of truly fresh fruits and vegetables, grown for their taste, and the loss of farmland and small-scale farmers are two faces of the same coin. In this issue of EXCHANGE, we meet Michael Rozyne, founder and managing director of Oxfam partner Red Tomato.
Also in this issue, ethnic discrimination in Guatemala—and the Mayan defense. Plus, how community radio is engaging Senegal's youth, and the humanitarian imperative of land mine clearance in war-torn Afghanistan.
]]>Foreign aid accounts for 90 percent of public expenditure in Afghanistan, so how aid is spent has an enormous impact on the lives of almost all Afghans and will determine the success of reconstruction and development.
Matt Waldman, Afghanistan policy advisor for Oxfam International, said:
?So far, international aid to Afghanistan has not gone far enough to alleviate the poverty and suffering of the Afghan people. The amount of international aid has been wholly insufficient given the huge job of reconstruction in Afghanistan. Of the aid that has been given, too much has been driven by the priorities of the international community and its security concerns rather meeting the needs of the people and building a more effective state.
?This is a critical meeting, which will map out the direction that donors will take to rebuild Afghanistan. Too often, the country has suffered from bold promises which are soon forgotten.
?International donors meeting today must pledge more aid, but they must also make sure the money is spent better. More funds need to go through the Afghan government, whose capacity and accountability must be strengthened. Donors should agree to be open and transparent with the Afghan government on the assistance they provide and the programs they conduct. Less money should be spent on for-profit, private contracting firms and consultants. Aid needs to be more transparent and better monitored, with the emphasis being on getting help to the poorest Afghans in rural areas.?
Oxfam would like to see:
Large parts of Afghanistan are facing crisis as a result of the cumulative effect of factors including the harsh winter, high food prices, drought, and increasing and spreading insecurity.
An Oxfam assessment in one of the worst affected provinces, Daikundi, shows that people may be facing the worst conditions in over 20 years—and similar conditions can be found in other provinces. As it is almost impossible to deliver aid to rural areas during the harsh Afghan winter, concerted action is needed now to avert the crisis.
?This is a race against time, the international community needs to respond quickly before winter when conditions deteriorate. The health of one million young children and half a million women is at serious risk due to malnutrition,? said Oxfam?s Head of Policy in Kabul, Matt Waldman.
"If the response is slow or insufficient, people could be forced to sell assets or leave their homes and villages, and there could be a further deterioration of stability. Infant, child and maternal mortality rates—already some of the world?s highest—could increase even further."
Oxfam calls on donor countries urgently to provide sufficient funding for the response, especially the emergency appeal for Afghanistan launched in July, and support measures to increase the humanitarian capacity of the UN in the country. Some countries such as the US, UK, and Canada, as well as the EC, have already committed funds, but many more have not.
In a letter to International Development ministers around the world Oxfam warns that this is a crucial time to support Afghanistan?s development and also calls for long-term measures to strengthen food security and reduce vulnerability to disasters; in particular:
Oxfam also believes that a range of measures are required to enhance aid effectiveness including full transparency, indicators and targets with monitoring of aid effectiveness, more effective coordination mechanisms, and greater equity in the distribution of aid.
In five provinces, including highly affected areas such as Badakhshan and Daikundi, Oxfam is assessing the impact of drought and price rises on people?s access to food and water and is planning an initial emergency response of USD 1.8 million. In Badakhshan, for example, Oxfam will assist with the rehabilitation of water supplies and provide cash to enable 17,500 people to improve their consumption of food and clean water.
Oxfam is also implementing longer-term rural programs, directly or through Afghan partners, in a total of 11 provinces. These aim to promote sustainable livelihoods including through the distribution of seeds and fertilizer, livestock, supporting grain banks and increasing people?s purchasing power through cash-for-work projects.
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