Afghanistan without poverty: a plain language guide to poverty in Afghanistan

Afghanistan is one of the poorest countries in the world: approximately 53 percent of the population live below the poverty line, the average literacy rate is 28 percent and life expectancy just 43 years. In addition, some 136,000 people are estimated to be internally displaced. But what is the government’s approach to poverty reduction and what are its ongoing activities? In an attempt to build stakeholder support for it's initiatives the Agency Coordinating Body for Afghan Relief (ACBAR) has recently produced a plain language guide to increase public understanding of poverty and development initiatives in Afghanistan.

Divided into eight parts and including a glossary, the report describes the different types of poverty in Afghanistan, summarises poverty information for the country and outlines the key goals, benchmarks and targets of the Afghanistan National Development Strategy (ANDS), the country’s first PRSP.

To qualify as a PRSP, the ANDS was formulated in consultation with the public. ACBAR also carried out a medium-scale poverty assessment – the Afghanistan Pilot Participatory Poverty Assessment (APPPA) - to include poor people’s voices in the ANDS. In 2007, the APPPA conducted research in 8 field sites over a period of 12 weeks using a range of communication tools. According to its findings, which are included in the report, the development priorities of the Afghan people are:

• health and education services
• clean drinking water
• job opportunities
• roads
• irrigation and water storage facilities
• security and rule of law
• market access
• regional government and reduced corruption
• improved services for women and girls
• disaster relief

The report encourages civil society actors to monitor the government’s delivery of the ANDS by working with the legislature to form pressure groups that can work with the government to ensure that progress towards ANDS targets is being met.