One of the Taliban's first acts after they swept to power in Afghanistan a month ago was to force most working women out of their jobs and into their homes. That's going to add to the risk of starvation facing the country after years of crop failures and the collapse of this year's wheat harvest.
In an aid-dependent economy already in deep trouble, the sudden removal of tens of thousands of wage earners, many supporting large, extended families, only adds to the numbers facing hunger in a country where 47.3% live below the poverty line. What happens outside the cities could be even more devastating. Women make up nearly a third of the rural labor force. Without them, the problems of a country that's barely able to feed itself will only be compounded.
Afghan women's number one fear is not being able to work, and losing access to education is a close second, says Heather Barr, the associate director of women's rights at Human Rights Watch. With so many men killed in the conflict, or fleeing the country, a significant number of women have been left as both single parents and sole breadwinners supporting their parents and other relatives.
"The Taliban cutting off women's ability to work is not about their feelings of empowerment — though this is important — it is about losing any ability to feed themselves and their family," Barr notes.
As the Afghanistan Analysts Network, an independent research group, wrote on Sept. 6, the price of essential items, from flour to cooking oil, has risen while the value of the afghani, the currency, is depreciating. In a second-hand market in Kabul, desperate families are selling household goods to buy food.
Even before this year's crisis, Afghanistan was stalked by hunger because of a devastating drought in 2018 and 2019. Only North Korea and six nations in sub-Saharan Africa were making do with fewer daily calories, according to the United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organization.
The Taliban's takeover will make all these problems more acute, because poverty, undernourishment and gender inequality go hand-in-hand. Although women and girls tend to be more resilient in the face of malnutrition, in patriarchal societies they also suffer the worst deprivation and long-term side-effects, as more food is allocated to the males of the household.
Living on the edge of hunger can be both a cause and effect of women's reduced status. Economic empowerment typically begins with control over at least some part of the household finances. Even in patriarchal societies, there's evidence that relinquishing men's grip over money can lead to a virtuous circle of increasing equality, earnings and well-being. The effects can be significant: Malnutrition among children falls about 43% when women are in control of any rise in incomes, and the improvement is even greater when they have better access to education.
