DAI KUNDI - Over four thousand people from around Dai Kundi came out today to celebrate the city’s Almond Festival, an annual event organized by the provincial government.

Almond cultivation is a significant driver of the Dai Kundi economy and the almond festival is an opportunity for farmers, residents and officials to gather, celebrate and pray for a rich harvest. Significantly, almonds are the only major product produced in Dai Kundi which are sold outside of Afghanistan. 

“The aim is to highlight the significance of agriculture products like almonds in the economy of Dai Kundi province and to attract more marketing opportunities and agriculture assistance,” said Qurban Ali Oruzgani, the Governor of Dai Kundi province.

According to figures from the Ministry of Agriculture around 5,500 tons of almonds are cultivated annually in Dai Kundi, about 11% of the Afghanistan’s annual total. Other significant almond growing areas include Zabul, Ghazni, Samangan and Balkh. Figures from the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (UNFAO) show that Afghanistan is among the world’s ten largest producers of almonds, and almonds are a significant export.

The industry in Dai Kundi has lately suffered some setbacks. Disease and drought has reduced the annual harvest by nearly 25%.

“Almond trees face different agriculture diseases during the year which decrease the harvest and which is very costly for local farmers,” said Mehdi Muahidi, the Head of Agriculture and Livestock department in Dai Kundi. “We need the central government to spend more to support this industry.”

In many ways Dai Kundi’s almond production practices are still rooted in the past. As they’ve been doing for centuries local traders from Kabul, Ghazni and Kandhar travel to Dai Kundi and visit village by village to inspect the products and to make deals.

“Proper marketing of this agriculture product is the other problem farmers complain about, local traders buy one Kilogram of good Almond from farmers at 1.5 dollars while the rate in the international market where the farmers don’t have access is five times more,” said Mr. Muahidi. “We are working with farmers to train them on standard agriculture techniques to increase the production and the provincial administration is interacting with the private sector to find proper market for Dai Kundi’s almonds.”