WHERE HAVE ALL THE FLOWERS GONE? The real reasons for the drop in the poppy crop in Afghanistan in 2015

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13 min readOct 20, 2015

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Levels of poppy cultivation have fallen by almost a fifth this year, dropping from an estimated 224,000 hectares (ha) in 2014 to 183,000 ha in 2015. According to United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) statistics this is the first time in six years that there has been a reduction in overall cultivation in the country. The Executive Director of the UNODC - Yuri Fedotov talks of the need for the Afghan government and the international community to build upon these “hard won achievements”, implying that it is drug control interventions that have delivered this turn around. The UNODC Regional Representative for Afghanistan and Central Asia, is also cited as accrediting the reduction to “better cooperation between law enforcement agencies and Afghan policy makers”. Even the National Unity Government of Afghanistan, has claimed that the reductions in cultivation can be attributed to its first year in office.

Detailed field research and geospatial analysis, however, reveals that the reasons for the dramatic reduction in cultivation does not lie with the actions of the Afghan government, or other external agencies, but with the repeated crop failure that has plagued the former desert areas of southern and south-western Afghanistan. These are areas where opium production concentrated over the last five years and which will become economically unviable if the crop continues to fail. Having relocated to the desert due to a lack of land, economic opportunities, and to flee the violence, unrest and corruption they associate with the Afghan government, elements of this desert population are once again on the move. The question is where will they go, and given their vehement dislike of the Afghan state and its foreign supporters, what impact will they have on the areas where they settle?

Turning Deserts into Flowers

Between 2003 and 2013 the amount of land under agriculture in the south and south western regions of Afghanistan increased from 150,000 ha to 414,000 ha. This rapid expansion was not a function of the efforts of western donors and the Afghan government but of a process of encroachment and settlement of former desert areas formally recognised as “government land”. Initially captured by local power brokers the land was distributed through patronage networks and then sold as a going concern. In the area north of the Boghra canal in Helmand many of these men were linked with the former governor Sher Mohammed Akundzada and the Karzai government. In the deserts of Bakwa in Farha province, desert land was distributed amongst the dominant Noorzai tribe.

As time passed and the rural population realised that the government was not going to do anything to prevent the encroachment of this desert land, the initial settlers were joined by even more farmers. This latter group were not just part of a burgeoning rural population unable to find land in the main irrigated valleys, but were those also fleeing violence and conflict, as well as the government’s efforts to ban opium production in central Helmand, and in other areas where the Afghan state and its foreign backers had gained a foothold. Many of them were the land-poor share croppers and tenant farmers who found themselves evicted from the main irrigated valleys once opium poppy was banned by initiatives such as the “Helmand Food Zone”.

It was these farmers with their knowledge of the opium crop and their need for land and shelter that provided the momentum for the surge in poppy production in these former desert areas after 2008. Land owners in the desert were presented with a bountiful labour force, skilled in the husbandry of opium poppy. Desperate for land and shelter these share croppers were willing to work for a smaller share of the final crop than in the main river valleys where poppy cultivation was becoming more challenging due to the growing presence of Afghan and international military forces.

But this was high cost agricultural production. The desert land needed to be cleared, levelled and fertilised. Machinery had to be hired and wells drilled into the underground water supply in order to irrigate the land. In the early days of settlement the wells were shallow, known locally as ‘bawre” but as more people came to farm in these former desert areas, the water table dropped and deeper wells — “barma” — had to be drilled. Generators, pumps and piping were also needed to draw the water. These were all extra costs that were not associated with farming in the main river valleys. And then of course there was the diesel required to run the pumps and generators. Purchased from local traders in 200 to 220 litre barrels each hectare of opium poppy required the best part of two barrels per season. Without the premium associated with illicit opium production this land would not have been economically viable and the land would not have been settled.

Drilling for water: The first requirement of any new settler in the desert is to hire a rig and tap into the aquifer — not even family members will allow a new farmer to borrow such an expensive commodity for more than a single season

Setting up camp in the deserts of Bakwa: In 2013 new settlers could be seen living in tents as they worked to bring land under agriculture to the north of what was already settled desert land

Its getting crowded round here: As time past and more farmers settle larger tracts of desert land were cultivated with opium poppy and wheat; it is rare that any other crops are grown

Ultimately opium production in these former desert areas was buoyed by cheap and skilled labour driven out of the main river valleys, more affordable technology from Pakistan, Iran, and China, and the growing availability of herbicides that eased the burden of the spring weeding — previously a tiring chore for the whole household. Further spurred on by a spike in opium prices that accompanied failure of the opium crop in Helmand in 2010 and concerns that the increased presence of military forces would deter production in the major opium growing districts of central Helmand — these former desert areas of southern and south-western Afghanistan became awash with opium poppy.

So much so that by 2013 the population of these former desert areas in the southern and south-western region had swelled to anything from 660,000 to 1.2 million people. In the area just north of the Boghra canal and south of Highway 1 there were 26,032 household compounds in 2013 where ten years earlier there had been all but a handful. The same patterns of expansion could be seen in the former desert areas of Zahre in Kandahar in the areas north of Highway 1 where tracts of desert land had also been captured and settled. In Nowzad in upper Helmand, Bakwa and Gulistan in Farah and in Maiwand in Kandahar it was the desert land surrounding the original Karez irrigated villages that was absorbed by the original residents and turned into cultivable land — the vast majority of which was dedicated to poppy. There were now fewer and fewer isolated farms surrounded by barren land as there was during the initial stages of settlement. Instead it was almost contiguous farmland, which in the case of the former desert areas north of the Boghra, stretched almost as far as Camp Bastion.

The loss of desert land: Analysis showing the dramatic loss in the quality of vegetation across the former desert lands of southern and southwestern Afghanistan. 2013–2015

And back to sand again

However, it looks like the good times are over. In their heyday these former desert areas were a potential route out of poverty for some, and a source of asset accumulation for others. The desert offered affordable land to those that had none before and were never going to be able to afford land in the canal irrigated areas where costs were 20 times higher.

With a reasonable yield even a share cropper could afford to eat meat and fruit three times a week, purchase medicine for family members who were sick, and in a very good year his share of the opium crop might pay for a motorbike to travel to the nearest bazaar or buy a solar panel to light the house at night. Those with larger landholdings fared much better and could accrue motor vehicles, multiple solar panels with which to run a tubewell; thereby bypassing the need for diesel or invest in some of their fallow land which could in turn be parcelled off to be worked by new share croppers and tenant farmers allowing even more money to be earned.

With the growing population and increased disposable income came more trading opportunities. The bazaars that straddled the Boghra canal in Helmand grew; they expanded the range of goods they sold and the number of market days held. Informal markets “the picnics” also began to appear much further into the desert space.

But this process of expansion into the desert areas reached its peak in 2013. Although there was continued new settlement in these former desert areas until as late as 2014 there were widespread reports of falling yields as 2012 but at that stage it didn’t stop people coming and trying to settle.

The Good old’ Days: When the opium economy was at its peak the markets straddling the Boghra canal grew. Like the one above in Nawabad Shawal, Nad e Ali, Helmand.

It has all changed now and repeated crop failure is compelling many to leave. The “disease” that started in the poppy plants in the area north of the Boghra canal in 2012 has not only hit the same land north of the Boghra canal again and again but it has now spread. The story is the same no matter where you go in the desert. Farmers report that the leaves of their poppy wither during the capsule formation stage. By the time capsules are formed they are smaller than usual and yield much less fresh opium than the 60 kg per hectare farmers were accustomed to.

During the initial years of the disease, farmers north of the Boghra canal would often lance their crop early before the disease took full effect but it did little to compensate for the falling yields. By late 2013 farmers in Bakwa in Farah were complaining of the same problems, although were not feeling it quite as acutely as those just to the north of the Boghra canal. Some share croppers even relocated from the desert areas of Helmand to Bakwa to mitigate the risk of crop failure. However, by the summer of 2015 the opium crop failed yet again. This time yields were at an all time low at just over 5 kg per hectare.

A picture of the salination that beleaguers the land in the former desert areas north of the Boghra canal

Of course farmers themselves blame it on the Americans. They report the noise of air planes at night and argue that their crops were sprayed. The poor desert soils, the high levels of salination that is evident across the area, as well as the poor cropping practices such as mono-cropping, the re-use of diseased seed and the absence of nutrient rich legumes- is dismissed as neither here nor there. It is the foreigners and the corrupt Afghan government that is to blame.

Ultimately these former desert areas are economically unviable without opium poppy. Farmers just cannot afford the high production costs, the diesel, the maintenance, and the labour without a decent yield from their opium crop. As the recent AREU report shows losses are currently U$ 1,500 per ha but can be even higher. The landless are the first to leave, searching out new areas to cultivate opium poppy as they did in the fall of 2013 when they left the desert areas north of the Boghra canal in Helmand for Bakwa on the Nimroz/Farah border.

Some have already moved back into the main canal irrigated areas of Helmand trying their hand at opium but even here the crop has failed. Others began the search for land in the summer months hoping that they might find somewhere that they could stay on during the coming winter.
Most recognise there is much less land available for share croppers in the main canal command area. Now that poppy has gone there just isn’t the same demand for labour. Not with the legal crops that have replaced opium such as wheat, cotton, mung bean and maize — they just don’t require as much labour. But what are they to do? It is not just the land that they need to grow both opium and wheat on, they also need the house that comes with the land, the irrigation that waters their crops, their family and their livestock.

From Bad to Worse: Analysis of the loss of vegetative index in the areas north of the Boghra canal, 2013–2015

In the last two years 11,000 ha of agricultural land has been lost in the former desert areas just north of the Boghra canal. If we look beyond this area into the former desert areas of Bakwa, Maiwand and Nowzad we see the same loss in agricultural land and drop in vegetative index. The 11,000 ha north of the Boghra canal that was agricultural land in 2013 but lies idle in 2015 would have sustained 50,000 people. Where are these people to go?

And what of the others experiencing the same crop failure in the other former desert areas of southern and south-western Afghanistan? A conservative estimate would indicate a further 15,000 hectares of land was lost in the former desert areas of Nowzad, Maiwand and Bakwa over the same period of time. This could be anything from 65,000 to 120,000 people on the move. Without land and jobs — and lets face it most people agree these are in short supply — what are these people to do, to make ends meet? And what is to happen if this pattern of crop failure were to continue and larger tracts of these former desert areas returns to sand? It would not just be the tenant farmers and share croppers looking for new places to live and new farmland, but those that have settled more permanently in these areas, building houses, communities and a place they have come to call home.

Where Have all the flowers gone?: The image on the left shows Camp Bastion in 2014 with agricultural land — much of it poppy — alongside its perimeter wall. Some farmers were helped by the waste water that seeped from the Base, storing it in small reservoirs and using it to irrigate their poppy and wheat. The image on the right shows the same scene in 2015 with much less land under agriculture and the loss of much of the crop that had been directly watered by Bastion the previous year.

Conclusion

It is not unusual for the drug control community to attribute reductions in cultivation to its own actions even where there is insufficient evidence to support such a claim. Many amongst this group will no doubt celebrate the reduction in this year’s cultivation and see it as “a job well done”. Although field research and high resolution imagery indicates that the 19% reduction in opium poppy cultivation that has occurred this year is not a function of the kind of efforts that UNODC describes but of repeated crop failure, the much more important issue is whether these crop losses in the former desert areas will continue.

Like it or not these former desert areas have been an important safety valve in the wake of growing population pressure and a finite amount of agricultural land in rural Afghanistan. The premium associated with producing an illegal commodity like opium, combined with improved access to affordable and improved technologies, has provided a burgeoning rural population with productive land in what was once barren earth. Without opium production this population will have nothing to sustain itself or the communities they have established. They are already on the move and many more are likely to follow.

At a time when the world is increasingly concerned about the flow of migrants into western Europe — of which estimates suggest as many one quarter may be from Afghanistan there are concerns as to where those from these desert areas will end up. This is not to say that farmers from these remote desert areas are likely to find themselves at the gates of Europe; they are most likely to be displaced within Afghanistan — at least to start with. But numbering anything from 660,000 to as many as 1.2 million people — which according to the official statistics is equivalent in size to that of the population of Helmand province — this is a sizeable population that will only add to the number of people looking for what are increasingly fewer jobs, services and resources, thereby further increasing the pressure on Afghans to migrate to neighboring countries and beyond.

What is more, given the particular history of those migrating into the desert — that of fleeing the corruption, unrest and actions of the Afghan authorities — and their vehement opposition to the Afghan state and its foreign backers, this is a population that may not make the best of neighbours wherever they find a new place to settle.

So while the United Nations commends the “hard won achievements” that they say led to this year’s reductions in cultivation, those who are interested in looking beyond simple drug control statistics might want to examine the real reasons why the poppy crop fell, explore whether this pattern of failing crops in the former desert areas will continue, and consider what impact it will have on the stability of Afghanistan, the region and the current outflow of people from the country that so many in Europe are concerned about.

Furthermore, informed analysts and commentators may also want to ask why it is that the United Nations and others are so unsighted on both why cultivation has fallen and what is happening in these former deserts spaces. As, despite the rapid growth in both agricultural land and population in these desert areas you still hear little about them; they are at best but a reference in the margins of official documents. The Central Statistics Office does not acknowledge just how populated these areas have become and therefore the surveys, polls and other data collection tools used in Afghanistan are unrepresentative of the population that live there, and thereby the country as a whole. Surely, it is rather hard for surveys to inform policies, as Yuri Fedotov has suggested this year’s UNODC survey could do, when we are not only blind to dramatic changes in population in the countries that are the major sources of migrants and refugees, but also on what is causing them.