News
Supporting locally-led development in Afghanistan with science
Tuesday 10th of September, people gathered at the campus of Wageningen to celebrate the remarkable collaboration between Village of Peace and the Wageningen Science Shop. The evening brought together individuals united by their concern and love for the Afghan people, particularly considering the issue of food insecurity. With nearly 20 million Afghans facing food insecurity and 6 million suffering from acute malnutrition, Laurens Lagerwerf, CEO of Village of Peace, emphasised the critical need for food security to break the cycle of poverty, violence, and injustice in Afghanistan. The collaboration with the Science Shop was formed to evaluate the work that Village of Peace is already doing: High Diversity Garderning (HDG).
Empowerment of local communities
Village of Peace has been working to empower local communities, particularly vulnerable groups like widows and children. Their focus is on the long run. Emergency aid is combined with training and programs, such as the HDG training, to work towards self-reliance and local ownership. Miss Amina, involved in the training, mentioned: ‘These women have not only become self-sufficient, but became role-models.’ And one of the participants said: ‘I thought working the land was only for men. Now I own my own garden and grow healthy food for my family.’
The collaboration
The local representative of Village of Peace, Mr. Farid Hakimi, said: ‘The program empowers people, and the progress so far is encouraging, but much more should happen.’ This is why Village of Peace sought the expertise of the Wageningen Science Shop. Their projects were creating tangible results, but a collaboration with the Science Shop was needed to find a way to back this up with evidence. The collaboration with the Science Shop connected Village of Peace with students, interns and researchers at Wageningen Centre for Development Innovation (WCDI), who aim at putting knowledge into action. The collaboration did not only help with creating a data collection tool for HDG program evaluation, but also included training on how to use the tool and analyse the data. This is all with the aim of Afghani program staff being able to carry out this process independently in the future. The international setting of this project was a challenging but enriching endeavour for everyone involved.
SEEDS Afghanistan
The result of this fruitful collaboration was not only the improvement in monitoring and evaluation, but also the start of a new organisation which was presented during the evening: SEEDS Afghanistan. SEEDS is a research institute that is focused on tackling the complex issue of food security in Afghanistan by engaging with local partners to work on practical solutions that will make a real difference for the most disenfranchised in Afghanistan. They will be working on sustainable solutions, empowerment of locals, and practical research on the availability, affordability and accessibility of nutrition.
Overall, it was an inspiring evening filled with stories of Afghan resilience and the ongoing efforts to improve empowerment and self-sufficiency, and work towards long-term development. This will continue with the establishment of a new organisation committed to advancing the empowerment of Afghans.