Editor in Chief: Moh. Reza Huwaida Thursday, March 28th, 2024

The Lagging Economic Development Efforts

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The Lagging Economic  Development Efforts

Sustainable economic development in the near future would be a key factor for improving Afghans’ living standards and reversing the current trend of growing disbeliefs among the public to the future. Afghanistan has been suffering a sharp economic decline since the last year political and security transitions in the country. Many Afghans are now more skeptical to the future given the current security and economic situations in the country. This year has been exceptionally difficult year not only because of the emboldened insurgency but also due to a continued economic decline in the country. According to the Afghanistan Investment Support Agency (AISA), investment in Afghanistan declined by $120 million during first six months of 2015 compared to the same period last year. The head of the AISA, Mohammad Qurban Haqjo, has expressed concerns regarding the trend, saying if the economic meltdowns continue the country would face a potential economic crisis. The prolonged economic challenges in the country indicate that Afghanistan would continue to face serious economic and security challenges in the Post-NATO era.

The current prolonged economic decline in the country is indeed a multi-faceted problem stemmed from various political, security and administrative issues. The adverse security conditions along with political challenges and flawed administrative environment are all major factors behind Afghanistan’s continued decline of economy and living standards of Afghans. The government is yet to become fully functional and recover from a long-lasting power struggle sparked by last year presidential elections. The leaders of the National Unity Government continue to care for their political interests rather than thinking about long-term interests of the country. It is obvious that such an administration would continue to suffer from the day-to-day differences among the stakeholders of the government. In fact the whole bureaucratic system of Afghanistan is suffering from a coherent and professional management and leadership preventing it from reaching key objectives of the government of Afghanistan. This leaves it paralyzed in terms of both day-to-day operation and strategic development.

This situation fails the government in its attempts to efficiently lead an economic development process and boost the economy through a coherent and sustainable of all relevant sectors of the government. Speaking on the investment decline this year, the AISA head stressed that the government should support investments and provide a favorable environment for investments in the country. The call reflects the above-mentioned problem in the government. The fact is that the government is in a good position to identify investment problems and prioritize the tasks for boosting the investments. However, the real problem is with the rifts in the leadership of the whole government and specifically the relevant economic sectors of the government. The management of the economic development of the country suffers from the existing power-sharing politics in the government. Unless the leaders of the National Unity Government (NUG) overcome the problem, it will not be able to lead a successful process of economic recovery.

On the other hand, due to the power struggle related to the power-sharing nature of the National Unity Government (NUG), the leaders of the NUG have failed to fulfill their pledges of election campaigns and implement their economic programs. During the elections campaigns, the NUG leaders had nice pledges and extensive economic plans. This is while now they are less concerned about implementation of their promised campaign pledges on economic development of Afghanistan. The power-sharing nature of the government will continue to be the Achilles’ heel of the NUG in leading successful economic development programs in the country. The NUG leaders need to work on creating a cohesive leadership and agree on mechanisms for better management of economic matters of the country.

The deterioration of security conditions in the country is another major factor undermining Afghanistan’s economic development process. With no doubt, insecurity would have an adverse impact on all areas of life including law and order issues and economic activities in the country. In terms of security, the year 2014 has been a particularly difficult year for Afghanistan. The NUG has been struggling to contain a new wave of Taliban offensive and a resurgence of different militant groups across the country. This has undermined the government’s efforts for economic development of the country, affecting economic activities not only in war ravaged areas but the whole country. There is of course no shortcut way for resolving the security challenges. However, the government could take particular measures to support investments and prevent further attrition of investments already made in the country. This would help minimize impacts of security challenges on the economic recovery of Afghanistan.

However, there is another challenge as a new phenomenon in the country: the growing public panic possibly resulted from the withdrawal of the international community from Afghanistan and the security crises in Afghanistan and the region. The growing lack of confidence among the citizens to the government and the future of the country is the most challenging problem in today’s Afghanistan. There are many reasons for the citizens to lose hopes to the future in terms of security and economic recovery as well as the government’s ability to handle the situations. The people are now much more pessimist to the future and their future in this country. The notion shared by a large portion of the population is that the country is not headed to the right direction. They see the prospect of security uncertain and predict lower living standards for their families. Widespread and the deteriorating unemployment are further exacerbated by the current security situation and the declining economy. This has further resulted to loss of public confidence to the government’s efforts for economic recovery of the country. Now many of citizens are leaving the country while many more are uncertain for staying or leaving in search of better lives.

The government needs to address the current trend of loss of public confidence to the future. The government should convince the public through a sound and efficient leadership of the affairs that the government will be able to lead the country into the right direction.

 

 

Abdul Ahad Bahrami is the permanent writer of the Daily Outlook Afghanistan. He can be reached at ahad.bahrami@gmail.com

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