Haji Wali Jan brought half a dozen plastic containers into the well at Qamar Kalagh on a recent Friday – one of a handful of days every week he and those living on his side of this Afghan village were allowed to use the water source .
When it was finally his turn, the 66-year-old filled one container, then another. The stream of water from the spigot became thinner. He began to walk on to another vessel – but the thread of water went away and then stopped before the pot was full.
The well was done for the day.
A boy pushes a wheelbarrow with canisters and his younger brother on his way to collect water from a still pool, about 3 kilometers (2 mi) from his home, in the village of Qamar Kalagh outside Herat, Afghanistan. (AP)
Afghanistan’s drought, the worst in decades, is now entering its second year, exacerbated by climate change. Of the country’s 34 provinces, 25 are hit by drought, and this year’s wheat harvest is projected to be 20% lower than a year ago.
As well as fighting, drought has contributed to the evacuation of more than 700,000 people from their homes this year, and the onset of winter will only increase the likelihood of disaster.
“This cumulative drought impact on already vulnerable communities could be another turning point of devastation,” the UN Food and Agriculture Organization’s Afghanistan office said in a tweet on Tuesday. “If this is not taken care of, agriculture may collapse.”
Two Afghan children sit next to a spigot as people try to fill their plastic containers with water in the village of Qamar Kalagh outside Herat, Afghanistan. (AP)
UN experts attribute the late 2020 La Nia event, which could change weather patterns around the world, to less rain and snowfall in Afghanistan by early 2021, and predict it will continue through 2022 .
Afghanistan has seen regular droughts for a long time. But in a 2019 report, the FAO warned that climate change could make them more frequent and more intense. Last year’s drought came on the heels of one in 2018 that Afghanistan at the time had seen its worst in years.
In the midst of the drought, Afghanistan’s economy collapsed following a takeover by the Taliban in August, resulting in the government shutting down international funds and freezing the country’s billions of assets held abroad.
Two brothers fill canisters with water from a still pool about 3 kilometers (2 miles) from their home in the village of Qamar Kalagh outside Herat, Afghanistan. (AP)
Jobs and livelihoods have disappeared, leaving families desperate to find food. The FAO said last month that 18.8 million Afghans are unable to feed themselves every day, and by the end of the year that number will be 23 million, or about 60% of the population.
Already in the grip of the 2018 drought, small villages like Kamar Kalagh are shrinking and not able to extract enough water to survive.
A collection of mud-brick houses in the mountains outside the western city of Herat, Qamar Kalagh is home to about 150 families who lived on the pay of their livestock, especially camels and goats, and men who worked as porters in Islam . Black border crossing with Iran.
Goats stand in front of Jar-e-Sawaz, a small village in the north of Herat, Afghanistan. (AP)
That work has also dried up to a great extent and now the main income of the village comes from selling sand.
Ajab Gul and his two younger sons recently dug sand from the river bank and stuffed it in bags. A full day’s work would earn them the equivalent of about $2.
“The grass used to grow up to here,” said Gul, placing her hand on her nose. “When a camel passed by, you could see its head. That was twenty years ago.”
Now there is no grass and almost no livestock.
Two years ago, the village’s main well had dried up, so residents collected money to pay for deepening it. It worked for a while. But soon it weakened again. Villagers started ration system: Half can take water one day, the other half the next day.
The granddaughter of Haji Wali Jaan, 66, stands at the entrance of her home in Qamar Kalagh village outside Herat, Afghanistan. (AP)
Ration is also not enough now. Wali Jaan said that the water of the well is enough for about 10 families in a day.
When Wali Jan could not fill his canisters, he sent two of his grandchildren to an alternative source. They turned the housework into a game: The older boy, about 9 years old, pushed the cart, his younger brother laughing while riding with canisters.
They went up the hill, down the other side, through another dry river bed – about 3 kilometers (2 mi) in total. Ploding down into tennis shoes with hands too big for his feet, the big boy slipped, and the wheelbarrow fell. Nevertheless, they made it into a pool of stagnant water at the bottom of the river, its surface covered with green algae. He filled the canisters.
When he returned to the village, his grandfather met him. He untied his turban and tied one end of the long scarf around a handle in the front of the handcart to help the boys walk the last slope to their family home.
Only the elderly and the young are left in the village. Most working-age men have left to find jobs elsewhere in Afghanistan, Iran, Pakistan or Turkey.
“Now you don’t get anyone outside during the day,” said Samar Gul, another man in his 60s. “Inside the houses are only women and children.”
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