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Rebuilding Afghanistan

Special Edition, January 2005
Issue #73

Completed irrigation channel

The US Government Fiscal Year 2004 marks an extraordinary year of progress in Afghanistan. The year opened with the completion of the first layer of paving on the Kabul-Kandahar highway - a highly symbolic link between the north and the south. The year ended with the inauguration of a democratically-elected President and the installation of a permanent government. This Special Edition of Rebuilding Afghanistan highlights several key achievements of 2004.

Re-establishing food security
The majority of Afghans are dependent on agriculture and related businesses for their livelihood. More than two decades of conflict and a prolonged drought greatly weakened Afghanistan’s agricultural system, depressing production and incomes from crops and livestock. Government reforms to promote private enterprise have been a key vehicle for re-establishing Afghanistan’s economy. With this environment and the entrepreneurial character of the Afghans, the transition to a market-based agricultural system made exceptional strides in 2004.

Kabul-Kandahar Highway open for business

Rehabilitating Afghanistan as a nation-state
The Taliban government imposed years of corruption, brutality, and tyranny on Afghanistan, reducing the country to political, economic, and social collapse. Through the pillars of the Bonn Accord and Afghan participation in developing consensus around that process, the building of a stable democratic state in Afghanistan reached significant milestones this year. Institutional strengthening contributed to improved civil-military relations and the emergence of a robust civil society. Programs to enhance the government's credibility and provide it with the tools and technical capability to govern effectively made large contributions in 2004. Also in 2004, significant progress in fiscal, banking, trade, land titling, and legal and regulatory programs strengthened Afghanistan’s economic development.

An Afghan man displays newly printed textbooks ready for distribution

Creating conditions for stability
War and neglect devastated Afghanistan’s health and education systems. One in every four Afghan children dies before the age of five, and adults have an average life expectancy of only 46 years. Under Taliban rule, only some 32% of school-age children were enrolled and 80% of existing schools had been damaged or destroyed. The basic health and nutrition of Afghans, particularly women, children, and displaced persons, improved this year. REACH (Rural Expansion of Afghanistan’s Rural-based Healthcare) brought basic services and health education to under-served communities, focusing on maternal and child health, hygiene, water and sanitation, immunization and the control of infectious diseases. In 2004, education programs trained teachers, provided textbooks, and introduced accelerated learning programs that allowed Afghan children to make-up for lost school time. Twenty-three years of conflict virtually obliterated the social and economic gains made by Afghan women in the mid-20th Century. A deliberate, targeted approach in all sector program designs ensured significant strides in gender equity in 2004.

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