Good News: Kabul Is Booming

ISAF put together a helpful video about the progress Kabul has made since 2001. While under the Taliban there were maybe a dozen phone lines in or out of the city, now there is a vast cellular phone network. There are enormous construction projects all over the place, including a standard-issue gaudy mall, and even plans for ridiculous impossible new neighborhoods.

Of course, this being an ISAF propaganda video, we must tempter it with a bit of reality. Only Kabul is booming—most other parts of the country, despite some construction projects, are not nearly as connected, powered, or safe (yes, safe). While it’s true half of Kabul has electricity 24 hours a day thanks to a brand new transmission line droped from Uzbekistan, the other 93% of the country still must scratch and scramble for a few hours of juice per day. Even so, the widespread use of micro-hydro plants is a great idea, and one many Afghans asked me to provide for them when I was there (obviously I couldn’t, but the PRTs were swamped with requests).

Similarly, while there are now cars a-plenty, the status of the roads remains miserable. But there are cars, fuel is available, and even though the cars are unsafe and exported there because they fail basic safety and maintenance tests in their home countries, they are a booming industry.

So while the rest of the country still faces enormous problems of infrastructure, development, security, and governance, Kabul seems to be doing really well for itself. Which is nice—a spot of mostly good news amidst all the doom and gloom. But the vast majority of all aid money goes to Kabul and either doesn’t leave, or it goes right back to the donating country through high expat salaries. With so much money concentrated on a relatively small area, it’s no surprise that there’s been remarkable progress.

Tagged as: Afghanistan