Lauren Corke
Afghanistan- Climate Effect on Infrastructure
Developing Afghanistan’s infrastructure has been a constant struggle due to the diverse climatic zones and endless warfare. The United Nations recently announced that Afghanistan is “the world's sixth least developed country. Only 13 percent of Afghans have access to safe water, 12 percent to adequate sanitation, and just 6 percent to electricity.”[1] With a growing population after the fall of the Taliban, the country’s weak infrastructure has become more of a problem and a main focus in the current reconstruction movement. Traditional rural and urban living has proved insufficient for a country plagued with conflict.
For most of Afghanistan’s history, the majority of the population has lived off the land, farming and raising cattle in remote countryside settlements. Temperamental climates and difficult cultivation led to nomadic tendencies. In the past century, however, population growth has been more focused in the urban areas. The mid-1900’s was a brief period of peace and moderate development when “urban centres began to spill outside the city walls and to take on characteristics associated with Western models.”[2] This was mainly because the Salong Pass was expanded connecting Kabul to points in northern Afghanistan and allowing for unification and facilitated trade.[3] Kabul’s relative prosperity allowed it to develop and provide city services such as electricity and sewage disposal- an attractive perk to city life.[4] Later in the century, however, a civil war broke out forcing profuse amounts of rural farmers to seek shelter in urban centers and destroying much of the advances in infrastructure recently made, including the Salong Pass.[5] Since then the fall of the Taliban has catalyzed the increase in urban populations. Refugees have finally been returning to their homeland from neighboring countries, pushing the cities past theirs thresholds in the process. These “people remained poorly housed and, lacking a central government, were forced to rely on private means for shelter.”[6] Currently there is a massive shortage of housing in the cities and an abandonment of rural dwellings.
The existing forms of housing depend on climatic regions and livelihood. There are essentially three kinds of dwelling styles in Afghanistan- rural nomadic, rural stationary and urban. The terrain is dominated by the Hindu Kush mountain range that is home to one of the greatest nomadic populations in the world.[7] The nomads are cattle herders and sometimes the farmers who are forced to follow the moderate weather and plush fields throughout the seasons. They seek high elevations in the intense dry heat of the summer and lower elevations in the freezing winter. Because of their need for mobility, these self-sufficient family clans often live in tents and yurts that house an average of four to five people.[8] There is an easily collapsible wooden frame covered with felt or skins for insulation. Roads, scarcities in general, rarely intersect their travel routes because of the rough terrain so major migrations are made by foot, with the help of camels or donkeys for supplies.[9]
There are some farmers who live in reasonably stable climatic zones that allow them to be stationary. However, even these semi-immobile groups tend to be tied by family to nomadic clans because settled land is quick to become overgrazed and fruitless.[10] Their marginal environment can include difficulties from floods to droughts. [11] These farmers, mainly in the northern and western regions of Afghanistan, often live in “traditional sedentary settlements...of fortified villages of stone and mud-brick known as gal’ahs.”[12] The mountains have grown increasingly dangerous with rebels and marauders roaming within them therefore it is important for villages and compounds to have strong fortified walls. However, this is meager protection compared to the relentless fighting over the past three decades. An “estimated 78,000 houses were destroyed,” especially in the vulnerable rural areas.[13] It is in these areas that the United Nations has focused their aid to “prevent the cities from being inundated by a flow of people from the countryside this winter.” [14]
However, the aid has not been enough and the urban population keeps increasing with refugees from war and farmers seeking safety in cities. Until recently, “urban dwellings were located within modest-sized city walls, unchanged for centuries in their basic layout.”[15] Only about 13 percent of the roads are paved, but badly damaged from years of civil strife.[16] There are almost no personal vehicles, so travel made by automobile is by bus or truck and city services-such as electricity and potable water-are currently limited by the US occupation and lack of funding. [17] The buildings, which can sometimes exceed several stories high, are made with more modern materials than rural dwellings, such as cement.[18] The lucky still have homes and apartments in these buildings, but there are thousands of squatters now entering major cities like Kabul with nowhere to live. The danger is that in Afghanistan’s sweltering summers the homeless have no clean water source and in the icy winters (especially in high elevations)[19] the homeless have no shelter from below freezing temperatures. The “poorest of all are packing mud around the bases of tents distributed by the United Nations refugee agency to block out the winter chill, and sleeping together, 10 to a tent, for warmth.”[20] Being a land-locked country, Afghanistan does not have stabilizing sea breezes and thus has high temperature fluctuations between the seasons and even between the day and night.[21] This only adds to the housing crisis, which is the main focus of the reconstruction efforts recently.
Overall Afghanistan’s climate put the country at a disadvantage in terms of developing infrastructure. An arid, mountainous region leads to unsustainable farms and little on which to base an urban economy. The country’s constant struggle for peace has only heightened this issue, damaging any progress made in the mid 20th century and eating up funds that could be used otherwise.
WORKS CITED
"Afghanistan." Encyclopædia Britannica. 2007. Encyclopædia Britannica Online. 27 Nov. 2007 <http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-226136>.
“Afghanistan Housing.” Asia and the Pacific. 2007. Encyclopedia of the Nations. Nov 25 2007. <http://www.nationsencyclopedia.com/Asia-and-Oceania/Afghanistan-HOUSING.html>
“Afghanistan Transportation.” Asia and the Pacific. 2007. Encyclopedia of the nations. Nov 25 2007. <http://www.nationsencyclopedia.com/Asia-and-Oceania/Afghanistan-TRANSPORTATION.html>
Blood, Peter R ed.” Afghanistan: A Country Study.” Washington: GPO for the Library of Congress. 2001. Library of Congress Online. 9 Dec 2007. <http://countrystudies.us/afghanistan/32.htm>
Chopra, Anuj. “Afghanistan Faced with Severe Housing Shortage.” World Politics Review Exclusive. 2007. World Politics Review. 8 Dec 2007. <http://www.worldpoliticsreview.com/article.aspx?id=1255>
Gall, Caroletta. “Half a Million Afghan Refugees Left Homeless and Cold in Cities.” New York Times. 2003. Colorado Campaign for Middle East Peace. 7 Dec 2007. <http://www.ccmep.org/2002_articles/010103_half_a_million_afghan_refugees_l.htm>
[1] Chopra
[2] “Aghanistan Housing”
[3] Blood
[4] “Afghanistan”
[5] “Afghanistan Transportation”
[6] Chopra
[7] Griffin
[8] “Afghanistan Housing”
[9] “Afghanistan Transportation.”
[10] Griffin
[11] Griffin- for example the severe drought from 1998-2001 and the flood of 2005
[12] “Afghanistan Housing”
[13] Gall
[14] Gall
[15] “Afghanistan”
[16] “Afghanistan Transportation”
[17] Gall
[18] “Afghanistan Housing”
[19] Blood- Kabul has an elevation of around 1800 meters
[20] Gall
[21] Blood