‘I would join Isil to prevent my son dying of hunger’
Desperate Afghan families struggle to survive as worst drought in decades causes agriculture to collapse
AFGHANISTAN’S worst drought this century has left Ghulam and his family with only desperate options. Month by month he has watched his land turn to dust and his livestock die as rain has refused to fall.
Like thousands of others, he has brought his family to the city of Herat, a famed hub for trade with Iran, in the hope the Afghan government can stop them starving to death.
But, left in limbo in pitiful roadside encampments, they are considering whether their best chance may now be to leave their country. North and western Afghanistan are facing their most severe drought in decades as the cumulation of several years of low rainfall has caused agriculture to collapse.
A total of 20 of Afghanistan’s 34 provinces have been affected, with some of the worst including the western and northern regions of Balkh, Ghor, Faryab, Badghis, Herat and Jowzjan.
The crisis is another burden on a country still wracked by violence and with a languishing economy.
For many it may be the final straw to push them into leaving Afghanistan, taking a path travelled by millions of their compatriots to seek work and a better life in a neighbouring country or even as far away as Europe.
“We are facing catastrophe,” the 45-year-old farmer told The Daily Telegraph last week in an encampment of around 100 families, all driven off the land by lack of water.
“I can assure you that some nights, none of these families have even bread to eat, and they go to sleep hungry. If we don’t get help here, we will be forced to go to Iran or Pakistan.”
His despair has meant that emigration is not the only desperate measure he has considered. “If I saw my son losing his life because of hunger, I would do everything to save his life. I would join Daesh [Isil] or the Taliban, because my son is hungry and I will join anyone who gives me money to save my son’s life. Everyone thinks the same.”
A record lack of snow in Afghanistan over the winter, blamed on the La Niña weather cycle in the Pacific, has been followed by rainfall up to 70 per cent less than normal in some places. Water levels are so low that wells have run dry. The United Nations has estimated that at least 1.4 million people will need urgent food aid in the coming months.
In a neighbouring camp, Haji Abdul Ghayoum, 54, from the Pashtoon Koot district of Faryab province, had also turned his hopes to emigration. “I have two young sons who are working in Iran but they cannot feed us,” he said “Now I am arranging to go to Iran with my entire family.
“Life is too hard here. There is no job to do. And if the situation in Iran is not too good for my family I will decide to go Turkey as some of my relatives did.”
Years of war and economic hopelessness have meant Afghanistan has produced one of the biggest refugee and migrant populations in the world.
Afghans were the second largest group during the recent migrant crisis, with more than 178,000 mainly young Afghan men applying for EU asylum in 2015 and 183,000 the following year.
People rarely flee the country for one single reason, said Ahmadi Gul, who manages the International Organisation for Migration’s aid programme in Afghanistan.
Ongoing violence and a lack of employment play a part, but the drought will now add to them, he suggested.