Author: David Mansfield / Topic: Farming

Author:: David Mansfield and Paul Fishstein
Publication Date:: 06-2016
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Afghanistan Research and Evaluation Unit (AREU)
Abstract:: This “watching brief” has described a number of trends with respect to agriculture, land settlement, and opium poppy in several areas of Afghanistan. It highlights two separate but highly related issues. First, what will be farmers’ response to changes in technology and agro-economic conditions? While cost-reducing technology such as solar-powered tubewells may allow the cultivation of crops with lower returns than that of opium poppy, will farmers choose to grow these crops or will they stay with poppy? Will they even look to cultivate a second crop of opium poppy in May as some reports from the field suggest? Second, while the new technology has allowed the expansion of agricultural production to former desert areas and supported livelihoods for marginalised households, given Afghanistan’s tenuous water resources (leaving aside climate change) and population growth rate, how sustainable is an agriculture that continues to deplete groundwater resources by allowing their use on an essentially “free” basis?
Topic:: Agriculture, Science and Technology, Water, Drugs, and Farming
Political Geography:: Afghanistan and Middle East

Author:: David Mansfield and Adam Pain
Publication Date:: 12-2008
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Afghanistan Research and Evaluation Unit (AREU)
Abstract:: The briefing paper argues that to truly understand what will create sustainable change in the Afghan opium industry, observers need to improve the tools being used to measure the success of counter-narcotics efforts. Measuring opium poppy-cultivated area serves as one of the few—and, in some cases, the only—means of gauging counter-narcotics success or failure. But relying on this indicator alone will not give policymakers an accurate sense of what drives opium poppy cultivation or what will sustainably reduce it. Until new indicators can inform counter-narcotic policy, perceptions of “failure” or “success” will likely continue to focus on short-term fixes rather than reach the root of the problem with long-term solutions. The paper concludes that a number of other indicators should be studied to improve policy concerning opium, including: incomes, physical security, food security, commodity markets and cropping system diversification. It also offers viable suggestions for ways to measure these markers of success or failure.
Topic:: Security, Drugs, Trade, Sustainability, and Farming
Political Geography:: Afghanistan and Middle East

Author:: David Mansfield and Adam Pain
Publication Date:: 11-2007
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Afghanistan Research and Evaluation Unit (AREU)
Abstract:: For many rural households the cultivation of opium poppy represents the key means by which they can achieve welfare under the conditions of pervasive risk and insecurity in Afghanistan. This briefing paper argues that understanding changing levels of opium poppy cultivation in Afghanistan requires recognition of the multifunctional role of opium poppy cultivation in the livelihoods of rural Afghan households.
Topic:: Security, Agriculture, Rural, Drugs, and Farming
Political Geography:: Afghanistan and Middle East

Author:: David Mansfield and Adam Pain
Publication Date:: 10-2005
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Afghanistan Research and Evaluation Unit (AREU)
Abstract:: This briefing paper examines what is needed to effectively pursue alternative livelihoods as a goal of counter-narcotics, and argues for conventional development interventions to be viewed through a counter-narcotics lens to establish how they impact on opium poppy cultivation.
Topic:: Agriculture, Drugs, Illegal Trade, and Farming
Political Geography:: Afghanistan and Middle East

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