AFGHANISTAN* (18 September)
Cereal harvesting in most of the country is complete, and estimates point to a record cereal harvest this year. The FAO/WFP Joint Crop and Food Supply Assessment Mission (CFSAM), which visited Afghanistan between mid-June and 8 July, estimate this year’s aggregate cereal harvest at 5.37 million tonnes, compared with an average output of the past five years of just over 3 million tonnes. The harvest this year includes some 4.36 million tonnes of wheat, 410 000 tonnes of barley, 310 000 tonnes of maize and 291 000 tonnes of rice. This year’s estimated record harvest benefited from increased precipitation, ample irrigation water availability and significantly large areas planted with cereals, in particular rain-fed wheat planted in marginal lands. Cereal import requirements for the 2003/04 marketing year are estimated at about 392 000 tonnes, just one-quarter of last year’s import requirement. Commercial imports in the recent past have amounted on average to about one-half million tonnes per year.
Access to food will be difficult for many households, despite the estimated record harvest. A multi-agency National Risk and Vulnerability Assessment mission will determine the exact amount of food aid requirement for the 2003/04 marketing year in the near future. Following early signs of depressed wheat prices in some parts of the country, the CFSAM has strongly recommended that a significant proportion of the prospective food aid should be domestically procured so that the farmers are not unduly penalized through low wheat prices.