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Access to Labour: The Role of Opium in the Livelihood Strategies of Itinerant Harvesters Working in Helmand Province, Afghanistan
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STRATEGIC STUDY #4
Final Report June 1999
1. ObjectiveTo further UNDCP?s understanding of the source and mobility of the labour force required to harvest opium poppy in Helmand Province, and identify possible strategies to ensure that regional development initiatives aimed at achieving a sustainable reduction in opium cultivation, address the role opium plays in the livelihood strategies of both landowners and labourers.
2. Introduction
Opium poppy is a labour intensive crop. Indeed, estimates suggest that approximately 350 person days are required to cultivate one hectare of opium poppy in Afghanistan.6/ These estimates would appear to be consistent with other source areas such as Thailand and Laos where estimates of the labour required for the cultivation of opium poppy range from 300 to 486 person days per hectare.7/
In Afghanistan, harvesting alone is thought to require 200 person days per hectare. Consequently, to spread the demand on both hired and family labour during the harvest period, households have been found to both cultivate different varieties of opium poppy with differing maturation periods and stagger the planting of opium poppy.8/ However, despite these efforts the majority of opium producing households still require hired labour during the opium poppy harvest. Indeed, previous fieldwork reveals that 70% of those respondents that cultivated opium poppy were found to hire labour during the opium poppy harvest.9/As such, opium poppy provides a valuable source of livelihood not only for those who own the land, but for those that are employed to work the land on a short term basis. This Study seeks to explore the motivations and circumstances that influence individuals in their decision to work as itinerant harvesters and the role that this off-farm income opportunity plays in their overall livelihood strategies.
Given the increasing fragmentation of landholdings in rural Afghanistan and the absence of non-farm income opportunities, there would appear to be a need to address the needs of itinerant harvesters during the design and implementation of regional development initiatives aimed at achieving a sustainable reduction in opium cultivation. A failure to provide alternative off-farm or non-farm income opportunities for these mobile workers may well result in opium poppy cultivation relocating to new areas, the so called ?balloon effect?. Indeed, fieldwork has already revealed that itinerant harvesters play an important role in the expansion of opium poppy cultivation into new districts in Afghanistan.10/ Consequently, to neglect the needs of this group would appear to be to the detriment of both alternative development and conventional development objectives.
3. Methodology
The fieldwork for this Study was undertaken during the harvest of opium poppy in Helmand province in 1999. A total of 75 in-depth interviews were conducted in five districts between 25 April and 18 May 1999. To explore the diversity of both upper and lower Helmand, fifteen interviews were conducted in each of the target districts of Marja, Nad-e-Ali, Musa Qala, Kajaki and Nawzad (see Annex A: Terms of Reference).
Interviews were conducted over a wide geographical area so as to verify findings and distinguish between generic patterns and localised issues. Interviews were conducted in a conversational manner and due to the sensitive nature of the subject matter, notes were not taken during the interview, but written-up once the interview had finished and the interviewer had departed.
It is important to note that it is difficult to determine how representative the findings of this Study might be. Given the sensitive nature of the fieldwork, respondents were selected based on existing contacts within each of the districts visited. Moreover, the reports of increased opium poppy cultivation in Helmand in 1999 and the rise in payments for those wishing to be employed as itinerant harvesters, may have led to an influx of new labour to the province. Indeed, according to fieldwork, almost one fifth of those interviewed were employed as itinerant harvesters for the first time in 1999. Consequently, the findings of this Study should be taken as indicative, documenting the process by which a cross section of respondents have begun their work as itinerant opium poppy harvesters and the role that this work plays in their overall livelihood strategies.
6/ This compares with 41 person days for the cultivation of one hectare of wheat and 135 person days for black cumin. For more details see Socio-Economic Baseline Survey for UNDCP Target Districts in Afghanistan (forthcoming).
7/ Cited in Mansfield (1996) Alternative Development: The Modern Thrust of Supply Side Policy in Mansfield and Whetton - Illicit Drugs in Developing Countries: A Literature Review. A paper commissioned by the Economic and Social Council on Research of the UK Government's Department for International Development.
8/ See Strategic Study 1: An Analysis of the Process of Expansion of Opium Poppy Cultivation into New Districts in Afghanistan (Preliminary Report, July 1998) and the Afghanistan Annual Opium Poppy 1999 (forthcoming).
9/ See Socio-Economic Baseline Survey for UNDCP Target Districts in Afghanistan (forthcoming).
10/ See Strategic Study 1: An Analysis of the Process of Expansion of Opium Poppy Cultivation into New Districts in Afghanistan (Preliminary Report, July 1998).
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