People in Afghanistan are facing multiple crises, including displacement, drought, chronic poverty and natural disasters, all of which demand a humanitarian and livelihood response. The worst 2018 drought in decades contributed to a deteriorating humanitarian situation across Afghanistan. The 2019 Humanitarian Response Plan (HRP) estimates that 6.3 million people in Afghanistan are food insecure and in need of humanitarian assistance, including 4 million due to the consequence of 2018 drought.
Following two years of severe drought and early flooding in March and April has affected over 200 000 people and destroyed over 10 000 homes. Beyond the direct damage caused by the flooding, there have been serious losses of agricultural land, livestock and livelihoods.
Livestock is an important household asset as farm animals are used for food (milk and meat), income through the sale of animal products and as a family safety net for sale in times of crisis. The loss of these household assets dramatically increases vulnerability and the likelihood of displacement, and pushes rural communities further into food insecurity. Herders reported lack of water, pasture and fodder as the main challenges faced by rural households. This led to a deterioration in livestock body conditions and productivity, with deaths and increased distress sales of core breeding stocks across the country.
In 2018 and 2019, FAO’s emergency response is made in close coordination with respective Ministry of Agriculture, Irrigation and Livestock (MAIL) focusing on saving livelihoods and building resilience of 177 958 vulnerable smallholder farmers and herders households, where one of the components of which is procurement of agricultural inputs. This equates to provision of the certified wheat seeds (2 453 MT), fertilizers (4 906 MT), pulses seeds (41.70 MT), vegetable seeds (4.04 MT), concentrated animal feed (17 981MT), drought resistant fodder crop seeds (205.36 MT) and animal health support so that the country’s farmers, pastoralists and food producers’ can protect their livelihoods and improve Afghanistan’s food and nutrition security.
FAO, considering the support to emergency and fact that swift action had to be undertaken, applied its fast track procedures and focusing that 100 percent of the inputs procured from the local market. The quality of the response to FAO calls for procurement tenders from the private Firms and Companies is assessed as overall satisfactorily. The majority of bidders exercised high sense of social responsibility by delivering the inputs in timely and effective manner, yet, there were some lessons learnt, especially with some new suppliers. These experiences of procurement in emergency environment in Afghanistan will be summarized by FAO for future references.
FAO will continue its efforts to priorities the delivery of emergency livelihoods assistance to address the acute needs in the country and support initial recovery and resilience building for the most affected communities.
Contributed by: Ilhom Muhomediev and Ezatullah Noori, FAO Afghanistan.
September 2019
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