 Good morning everyone and good afternoon or good evening for those of you who are joining from elsewhere My name is bill bird I'm a senior expert at the u.s. Institute of Peace working on Afghanistan and I'm really pleased to have you here for this important discussion USIP is happy to co-host today's program with the International Rescue Committee the Norwegian Refugee Council and Care and I would like to welcome to thank them and the other NGOs who are working on the ground in Afghanistan and doing difficult work under extremely difficult circumstances and Thanks to the panelists for taking time out of their schedules to join us today for this public meeting We invite both in-person and virtual audience to engage with us and with each other on Twitter throughout using the hashtag USIP Afghanistan and We also invite you to take part in today's panel discussion after some opening questions and follow-ups the Those of you who are connected virtually can ask questions in the chat box While those of you who are here in person can fill out the cards and ask questions Please give your name and affiliation when you do so. So we'll we'll give you credit for those questions We certainly can't promise to to respond to all questions But we'll certainly try to respond to some of them in the latter part of the meeting today well as a peace building institution founded by the US Congress more than 35 years ago USIP has been actively engaged in Afghanistan since 2002 and Even though so much has changed since August 2021 We are continuing to try to pursue that important agenda We're also very concerned and really want to draw attention to the Extremely difficult humanitarian situation and ongoing economic crisis in Afghanistan and also to trying to develop or propose Policy solutions to prevent further collapse and alleviate the impact on Afghans lives and livelihoods and Recently the humanitarian situation has only gotten more worse More urgent compounded by the Taliban's increasing restrictions against Afghan female staff in NGO working in NGOs in the UN as well as of course the Education bands which I'm sure most of you are in the room are familiar with and At the same time donors priorities are also changing and lead This leads to concerns about a steep drop in funding for humanitarian aid to Afghanistan so we have an esteemed panel of experts here with us today to discuss these issues and How to move forward To the extent possible Let me briefly introduce the panelists in the order in which they'll be speaking Our first panelist is Khalid payenda He is director and co-founder at the Institute of Development and Economic Affairs very nice acronym idea and it represents Afghan economists who are doing Serious analytical work on the current situation and the economy He previously served as acting minister of finance and other positions in ministry of finance as well as working for the World Bank Asian Development Bank and International Monetary Fund and he's published a variety of articles which some of you may be familiar with Our second the panelist is Samira Sayed Rahman She is the director of policy advocacy and communications for the international rescue committee based in Kabul and Unlike Khalid and myself. I should emphasize that our two key panelists are are actually Coming and visiting from Kabul She played a variety of roles working for nearly a decade including She worked as the communications and international relations advisor to Afghanistan's electric utility, which by the way, I would argue is one of the success stories over time in the last 20 years in corporatization and and Regularization of its activities and she also served as director of relations of the president in for the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan among other positions and our final panelist is Melissa Cornet Pronounce correctly more or less Okay, she is a researcher focused on gender issues based in Kabul since 2018 so quite a lot of experience encompassing both the Islamic Republic and the more recent Situation and she spent five years working for local and international organizations to document and advocate on issues like women's economic empowerment violence against women women's participation in the humanitarian response and the impact of the food crisis on women and girls she is cares humanitarian advocacy advisor and continues to work in Kabul and in the provinces Prior to working in Afghanistan. She worked for human rights institution such as human rights wash if Worldwide Federation of Human Rights Leagues or the Lightner Center for international law and justice full disclosure. I'm an economist so so Not familiar with human rights, right? Okay, so what we're going to do is I'm going to start with an initial Question for each of the panelists and then maybe some follow-up questions and then during that time We'll gather questions from the online audience as well as here and we'll try to respond to some of them so starting with Khalid penda, I mean Afghanistan is facing a humanitarian crisis, but underlying it are deep economic Problems and could you briefly outline what is happening in the Afghan economy? How it's affecting people's lives and livelihoods. What has led to the crisis and what are the economic? Prospects, please go ahead. Thank you very much. Thank you, Bill And thanks to us IP for for this timely discussion on Afghanistan where Spotlight might be shifting to other issues. I think it's important to bring Attention and focus back to Afghanistan where a lot of people live in a very difficult environment Human rights wise but also economically so just a recap of the last 22 or 23 23 months since the collapse of August and 2021 one-third of the Economy was wiped up overnight when eight billion dollars of aid was was what had because of of the collapse and this meant that a budget where Two-thirds of it to half of it was financed by donors, but also similar amounts going off budget Could not be delivered and it meant loss of livelihoods for literally Hundreds of thousands to millions of people in Afghanistan Inflation skyrocketed Because of the situation in Afghanistan, but globally with with post-covid issues with basic food items and peaking in July 2022 to 50% increase of year-on-year To on prices and people had difficulty Accessing and withdrawing their limited meager funds that they had with the banking Institutions hundreds of dollars. They could not because of of the issue with with liquidity. So The desperation was was was at a high level The situation has been Getting worse gradually at the end I'd be interested to to hear from Samira and Melissa on on what their take is but From 18 million people in need of assistance in mid 2021 To an estimated 28 to 30 million right now need humanitarian assistance as is a dire dire situation in any context and any context and time or place and this one Statistic what what should give you of the situation and in Afghanistan private sector in Afghanistan was in the last 20 years of Republic Was was developing it was thriving But there was a big weakness with it that it was all tied to to aid that was catering to International security forces, but also international aid and with the succession of aid abruptly came to a halt private sector companies resorted to their strategies of surviving either by Stopping operations or temporarily closing offices or laying off a lot of people or Introducing drastic reduction and wages which has impacted many thousands of of families So the Taliban fiscal policy or budget has not been a lot of help to to people because when you look into to the numbers which are not public by the way Most of their spending is going into Building their Ministry of Interior or defense around 50% of the numbers that I have seen of the latest budget Goes to those places where they have hired most of of their foot soldiers Not a lot of money goes into Services or health or education So the fiscal policy has not been helping the situation instead Brutal regime of collecting taxes has been very tough on on people from formal taxes on sales shopkeepers to informal religious Taxes and and and Countryside on on on products of agricultural products has been Has been making it difficult for for people the situation with overall Financial Institutions in Afghanistan being disconnected from the rest of the banking sector has not made it easier Cash consignments have to be physically shipped to to Afghanistan and there have been limited numbers of them so the overall situation while some may give out of context probably Statistics that it's stabilizing. It's not stabilizing if you look into it. It's a gradual decline and people are as I presented statistics are in a worse situation than than last year and Last year was worse than a year before and Unless and until there is a Engine to growth in Afghanistan. It's very difficult to see a way out of this humanitarian assistance Cannot sustain an economy regardless of how big the size of it is but you know given the the situation in Afghanistan and overall context where There are other demands on international aid elsewhere in the world. It's Getting difficult to to sustain even the current levels of Love of aid to to have honest on so the overall situation Unfortunately isn't isn't great. What's been sustaining and just to conclude has been the Humanitarian assistance that has been going to Afghanistan similarly remittances remittances large amounts of remittances my estimates around 800 million to a billion dollar from Afghans to their families to their ex-colleagues to their neighbors has been sustaining a lot of people and the third one so far had been the cultivation of poppy that that had farm gate Revenues of around a billion dollar for for farmers which going forward with the band If that's not replaced with any other alternative livelihood is going to make the situation much worse Thank you. Thank you Khaled Certainly the the numbers tell a dire picture I think now I'd like to turn to Samir Asaid Rahman for The more ground-level perspective your agencies deeply involved in delivering humanitarian assistance with that within Afghanistan and from your ground-level perspective, how do you see the humanitarian situation and outlook in the country beyond what shows up in the Macro-economic numbers which are really daunting that what are the human dimensions of this what I would call an ongoing tragedy Thank You Bell and thank you to the US IP for hosting us today As Khaled just mentioned the the numbers are are horrific 28 million people are in need of Humanitarian assistance 15 million of those are facing acute food insecurity IPC three levels What this means, you know needs are rising, but that's not to say that You know nothing has been done over the course of the last two years International assistance in terms of humanitarian aid has helped us curb a famine during the past two years And which is why we need continued and sustained levels of humanitarian assistance to Afghanistan and The poverty on the ground is visceral for those of us who have been in Afghanistan For some time. It's visible. It's in your face The lines of women outside the bakeries are increasing day by day You walk around and you speak to the shopkeepers. There is a little shortage of Actual food instead the food is there. It's on the shelves. It's on the carts But it's rotting because people do not have the means to purchase the food. I Was in logata just before I traveled here As some of you may know logata is just an hour outside of Kabul there I met a woman in who had been referred to a clinic that the IRC operates there She said that this was for the first time in her life She was forced to receive cash support humanitarian assistance As halled mentioned, you know, she's one of those examples Her husband was working in the private sector for a private company But with the worsening economy was forced to be laid off Pushing her family more and more into poverty and This is the story that you hear over and over again across the country more and more of the middle class is Falling into poverty more and more of the middle class are losing the economic opportunities Their access to cash that they had in the past and having to resort to humanitarian assistance All of our organizations inside Afghanistan have had to scale up our work over the course of the last two years Not only because of the rising needs that Khalid mentioned But also because of the cessation of violence having allowed us to access more of the country than we ever had access to before We are now able to reach parts of the country that never received public services You know, I always give the example of Helmand You know, we are now able to operate in in Sangin We are able to operate in Girish. These are areas that faced the brunt of the last 22 years of conflict from aerial bombings to fighting Between the Taliban and the ANA. We now have clinics that we have established in those areas I have visited some of the community-based education program In the villages there. We are able to reach more and more clients Across the country for the IRC in particular. We are now reaching over 200,000 clients a week That is more than double the numbers that we had before 2021 Beyond that, you know, as Khalid just mentioned Humanitarian assistance is not the solution to Afghanistan's current problems We need longer-term sustainable development funding to address some of the core issues that are facing the Afghan people NGOs like IRC, like CARE and the many who are still operating inside Afghanistan have showcased That it is possible to implement programming in Afghanistan and in a principled way NGOs have proven that we can work, that we can find workarounds and that despite Restrictions, we are able to reach more and more people But what is holding us back right now is not our ability to find ways to reach these communities It is fundamentally a lack of funding and I think this is something that my colleagues and I will address in later questions Thank you very much. I Don't know. I Expect Melissa, you're not going to have particularly good news following these two dire presentations, but Particularly focusing on the gender issues that that you're you've been Working on for the whole for your time in Afghanistan. I mean women and girls are suffering Disproportionately and this reflects serious gender issues and problematic social policies on top of the very weak economy and As Samira just said constraints on aid So maybe get go into a little more specifics about how you and other NGOs are navigating this difficult situation and how you are able to Continue to deliver critical assistance to Afghan women and girls and what are the constraints you face? Thanks Thanks. Thanks a lot for your question. Gender is definitely At the core of the issues we are dealing with at the moment in Afghanistan There are a few points and the first one is is definitely the extent to which Afghan women and girls are Disproportionately affected by the crisis the economic crisis the food crisis It's something that has been largely documented at care We did a report last year on the impact of the food crisis specifically on women and girls Showing for example in times of food insecurity how women and girls are the one who have less access to food inside the household There's this social cultural norms and perception for example that women and girls are not the one leaving the home to To go work and like men and women and boys So they are systematically the one less prioritized in terms of access to food They also suffering much more from negative coping mechanism and one of them that has been largely covered by the media is the rising child marriage within and countering Horrific situation when we meet families That are faced with the impossible choice of having to marry off Underage girl to be able to obtain a diary and and survive We also have been able to document how even before the band and the increasing constraints Women and girls were already the one that had less access to aid There was a one who was systematically less consulted Had much more problem accessing the aid to give you an example some organization had food distribution inside Mosque where women you know did not even have physical access and also less access to feedback and complaint mechanism That was an issue way before the bands Now when it comes to organizations not to injures the What has been happening since for the past two years is an increasingly Constrainting environment when it comes to to gender especially to reaching women girls Not just the band before that we've had all of the constraints on women ability to move without a mahram Intervened just of like operation reaching women and girls. It culminated in December Last December when we had the band on women aid workers working for NGOs Which while it which was later on extended to UN agencies in April This ban on women aid workers dramatically affected our ability to Deliver to the woman and girl beneficiaries but not just Talking about reaching women girls like women aid workers on integral part of our organization IRC care, but also NRC other big NGOs We have like around 40% of our staff woman So that also impacted you know like finance Procurement human resources not just like you know our women colleagues dealing specifically with women and girls So when we heard about the ban initially we were forced to suspend Temporarily our operations this was time for us to take stock to understand what was a situation and It's a seven months now since the ban What has been happening is that we have been working to find ways to continue Operating in Afghanistan with our women aid workers and delivering to Afghan women and girls It has not been an easy work. It has been very challenging, but it has been possible and Today more than six months after the ban. We are able to deliver. We are able to deliver Deliver in a principled manner with our women colleagues and to women and girls And the different ways we have been able to do that In the first months after the ban We have been able to negotiate and obtain nationwide exemption for women aid workers in the field of health and nutrition and in the field of education In parallel we have been able to work to find Local agreements usually temporary for women colleagues to be able to go to the fields and deliver some of the activities That are not under the sectoral exemptions We have been able to localize more of our work relying more on local partners We have been able for some of the activities to rely on third parties as women are not at least not yet impacted By bands on their ability to work in the private sector We also have been able for example to engage more women in the community so that they can work in Complementarity with our women aid workers So it's definitely has not been an ideal situation But we have been able to adapt our projects adapt always of working to continue delivering To give you another few example of the work we've been doing specifically on gender so care We call it a working group inside the UNC the cluster system Called the Gihar working group is gender-intermediate in action So we also have been working a lot in support of other organization, especially local organization to make sure That we are able to offer guidance training minimum standards to have gender responsive programming So All that to say that while it's been challenging it definitely has not been impossible to continue reaching women and girls It does take much more time energy and resources to do that because that involves much more engagement and negotiation That involves making sure that the women colleagues have access for example to Laptops and batteries and solar panel to work from home that involves, you know Like a range of kind of measures we have had to take And the problem that that my colleague Samira touched on is that we are now faced with kind of like a double burden Not only do we have to adapt our programming? We also are faced with a funding gap As of this morning I check Ocha's website as a humanitarian response plan is funded at 14.8% and we are in July So the biggest challenge actually became for our organization the fact that we are currently facing Funding cuts that affect our ability to continue delivering on the ground Maybe just to finish I'll mention a couple of statistics as well As part of the cluster system as you know, they are seven thematic clusters Six out of seven mentioned that right now the biggest issue is the funding gap Number two being the constraints imposed at the fact authorities the only cluster that is suffering more from the fact Authorities policy is a protection cluster as it deals with child protection gender-based violence, etc Another one While we as international NGO have been suffering from funding gap It's really local organization, especially women that organization that have been suffering much more from this funding gap We have under the gihar working group. We have a study coming out next month specifically looking at woman-led organization and we asked them what were they main challenging at the moments and The number one was lack of funding for 54% of them safety security of staff and challenges in terms of Delivering only came out number two and number three in terms of the challenges Since is a ban only a third of them 43% have been able to access new funding It has been an issue Most of them have been kind of surviving based on existing funding or just were forced to to stop operations entirely So maybe just to finish The situation that we've been describing to us is really like a double punishment on the one hand They have to deal with the constraints imposed by the de facto authorities and on the others They are not able to access new funding and so we really have this feeling of of being doubly Polished punished and and and this is having a huge impact on the ability to support Afghan women and girls Thanks Thank you, and thanks to all panelists for bringing up quite important and daunting issues and I would just again reiterate how Important and difficult and actually challenging, but also it sounds like Rewarding your work is in terms of trying to meet basic needs in Afghanistan I guess I'd first like to tease out a little more the funding gap. We know the month the we know the We know that there are shortfalls We know that the UN appeal is always overstated and they're quite happy if they get 50 60% of what they asked for But what I understand is at the moment the prospect are cut funding being cut in half And I'm just wondering maybe Samira and then Melissa if you can you highlight it that a bit But but really what does it mean? Or if you want to put it on the more positive side if there were an additional You know X amount of money 10 million 100 million for your organizations What more would you be able to do in the current situation and facing the various constraints? So maybe first Samira Well, we're currently in a situation where we can't even meet the Levels that we were meeting last year As Malin Melissa mentioned the humanitarian response plan is only 15% funded and we're in the middle of the year right now WFP has recently announced that they there will be 8 million Afghans that will not be receiving food assistance due to these funding cuts At the same time, you know if we are to receive additional funding We are we're all looking at ways of implementing programming that addresses some of that those Drivers of humanitarian needs Looking into longer-term sustainable programming economic livelihood programming one of the challenges that we are facing right now is With regards to development funding humanitarian assistance can only do so much. It's a band-aid solution Developing development funding is not coming in at the levels that it should be Right now for example If you look at women-led CSOs as Melissa mentioned These are the civil society organizations that were instrumental in the so-called gains of the last 20 years Over 90% of them have shut down or are partially Operational because they have lost funding over the course of the last two years Because the funding that goes to these organizations is considered development funding and not humanitarian assistance And we're not talking large numbers a five-woman Organization in daikundi or in world that contributes not only to the livelihoods of their family, but to creating space for women Often needs five ten thousand dollars a year to sustain themselves, but that funding has stopped as of August 15th 2021 There are mechanisms in place that can be helpful and have been helpful over the course the last two years if not The great, you know the last 22 years the Afghanistan reconstruction trust fund is one of those mechanisms For a response that has been helpful It's been a mechanism through which health sector and education sector workers have been paid, but we need to expand the ARTF to look into You know supporting longer-term sustainable livelihood programming climate smart agriculture programming Afghanistan is one of the countries that is worst affected by climate change yet contributes the least in terms of carbon emissions We have faced Drastic flooding over the course of the last two years. We have faced droughts that are impacting Farmers we are currently the north is in the midst of a locust outbreak That is going to impact the harvest come the fall and all of this is just going to exacerbate The humanitarian concerns that we are trying to address so I'll stop there and then maybe Melissa and color Just jump in because This humanitarian versus development drives me crazy as some people in the room are aware You could actually do basic development under the humanitarian name. So my my humble suggestion to donors and others is if if development if the word development is not possible then do some development under the humanitarian which was certainly done in the 1990s very small amounts and Conceivably could be done now, but your your points are well taken I'm just sort of At a loss because I think Khaled and I both think development funding Development is needed. However funded yet. It doesn't seem to I mean that seems to be almost the red line for for many donors Please go ahead. Sorry, but you know, I think when we talk about development funding. There is this Assumption that it means large-scale infrastructure programming that it means transmission lines or hydro power dams It's not maintenance of small roads from villages connecting people to health facilities It's not building of washrooms in education centers. That's also development funding But the word is very scary to the donor community Thank you If forgive me, but maybe I'll just ask Khaled to chime in on this issue of Development needs and then we'll go to you Melissa Yeah, I think Humanitarian assistance is not a long-term solution. You need to have Development and right now with the private sector paralyzed the only Feasible source would be for for donors to to have the development activities as Bill said maybe under the guise of humanitarian A lot of investment that Was happening in the last 20 years all the infrastructure to what Samira alluded they need maintenance How would you maintain those so that at least population have access to as she said to health clinics or our? other facilities to integrate markets It is important. I think it's it's doable I think it's important to look at how money is spent rather than just the quantities you could do Two different completely different Outcomes with the same amount of money given what channels do you use? How do you source goods whether it's locally or whether you just purchase for example wheat from Across the border in Uzbekistan and dump them in markets distorting But incentives for farmers in Afghanistan, you know, they have different Different ways of doing it. So I think development Is possible there are means if there is the will within the international community with International financial institutions to be a bit more I would say courageous and aggressive rather than Handing everything over to to UN and say this is your responsibility now to to do whatever you do with it I think there are mechanisms well established for example in the World Bank to do direct funding of care international or other NGOs rather than to have to go through a UN agency that would save a lot of overhead costs Those those are all all possibilities Thank you Khaled that gets into the cost effectiveness issue, which I'm sure the panelists have some views on but Melissa you've been patient. Maybe you can weave in some of this the what what additional funding can do particularly in the areas that you're focusing on and Maybe also if you want to take it on are there ways to improve the effectiveness Given particularly I mean Effectiveness from donor side to in terms of either requirements costs, etc Sure. Thanks. No, I mean I fully fully agree with the with both of the my panelists What the funding gaps mean right now is simply that we have to stop project We've had in several provinces have to stop of a mobile health team or food distribution or cash distribution, you know finding ways to For the staff to go on the other project, but it's it's becoming really really challenging for us and And I fully agree with the need to like find ways to go back to more sustainable projects I think the concerns we have right now is for the past two years We've been able to avoid the famine with the support of the donors who don't have been very mobilized There is government being the main one But the concerns we have is in the absence of More longer term projects We are kind of stuck in this loop of just emergency aid and in one or three or five years We may still be just distributing aid that prevents people from dying of hunger, but not actually building Anything sustainable that allows them to not be dependent on humanitarian aid and and like Samira mentioned like some of the projects We're looking at for example in in the livelihood fields a very very small scale We're talking really about being able to distribute Poultry to families or helping them set up like a kitchen garden so that we can grow, you know They own food we're talking about like tailoring embroidery training. So this is this is really really small scale but this is really a way for us to make sure that That the aid we're distributing is sustainable for the Afghan families and I'll stop there Could I just Kind of follow up and ask you a little bit more about this I mean is the work on gender particularly like like you're talking about like some of the livelihood issues making sure food gets delivered to to female headed households or Making sure women are not just completely left out of say basic food or other kind of livelihood assistant Or are there anything specific you can do on the gender front in terms of I? Hate to use the word rights because I'm so unqualified on it But rights kinds of issues the one though the one area I guess you said where Taliban restrictions are worse than the funding gap So I mean we have been able to continue continue doing for example We have a very large women's economic empowerment project the way we have had to do is adapt the ways We are we are implementing this project for example now We are focusing more on livelihoods that women can do from home for example So more embroidery and tailoring and cooking than public-facing businesses for example So we also have been have had to go back to the donors go back to the women beneficiaries and really listen to what? Is it that it's possible right now and what is it that they they want and for us this investment on in women economic empowerment is really key because this is what allows them to have More decision-making power inside the family inside the community and it's also an argument that works really well with de facto authorities Being able to show the economic positive impact that these programs can have We've have found quite Productive when we talk about when we talk with de facto authorities about these projects to get a rights approach So we're really talking more about the benefit for the community the benefit for the children's benefit for the families for the health Situations so it's really something that has been very successful that we are able to continue doing and that we are now really looking to At least maintain and if possible expand And and is the funding for that part of it? Adequate or could more funding be provided that would allow you to scale it up or I? mean when you compare a Portfolio before and after august 2021 we went from like 70% Development livelihood and 25% humanitarian to exactly the contrary now 75 75 sorry personal for project or pure humanitarian and 25 is development and I think it's been quite challenging for some donors because they are of themselves under huge pressure With very limited resources Not limit, but you know more pressure definitely in terms of the funding and the number of crises have been increasing that they have to Respond to it's been harder to make the case When they have to kind of choose between life-saving assistance and these kind of longer term Projects so it's definitely something we're trying to explain and and push. It's very hard for us to You know the life-saving assistance has to be like Kind of the most urgently, but like we also have to kind of like there's no point in in In doing all of these emergency assistance if we are not able to also have this conversation about how do we actually Find ways to get out of this of this humanitarian crisis Thank you, I think this we could have this productive conversation among ourselves and continue and I'll resist Asking too many more questions. I think Matt is kindly collecting questions from the group But let me just throw out probably again for the ground what call it raised this cost effectiveness issue Let me be a little bit. I mean you're talking about delivering. Let me be a little bit provocative and forgive me You're talking about delivering food assistance to women. Is that UN money or is it from elsewhere from VHA? Are there are there ways the procedures could be made improved and made simpler and avoid perhaps I don't know what you want to call it cascading overheads by different agencies Which you're maybe the last one and and you need you need to cover your costs within Afghanistan But there are many many others so without maybe being too specific, but are there some Some obvious issues both of you are either of you faces in terms of More positively are there Ways you see that the cost effectiveness of your your own assistance could be improved by either different procedures And we haven't even talked about the banking constraints yet and the cash shipments But but anything you'd like to to raise in this as a suggestion for for this Washington audience So maybe first Samira and then Melissa sure I mean even you on funding does come from alternative sources as well, right? So it's not their independent funding It's it is coming from different donor capitals One of the ways in which some of the you know aid can be more effectively utilized in Afghanistan is Decreasing some of these layers that we're having. I Know it's been a difficult time period for the international community having shifted from We were advocating for a lot of on-budget assistance But on-budget assistance to entirely off-budget bilateral assistance to the UN are directly to NGOs As you mentioned one of the challenges is the ability to get cash into the country We are having cash flown directly into the country and then that comes to us one of the challenges then comes The bigger challenge isn't for INGOs. I would say it is for national organizations For them to access funding it has become increasingly difficult for the the mechanisms the Compliance the requirements that are needed to access funding in the current Environment with increasing monitoring with increasing scrutiny on every dollar that we spend in Afghanistan It makes it that much harder for a local organization to access funding I think we need to as I think the international community does need to look at How can we streamline that process? INGOs Implement over 70 percent and national NGOs implement over 70 percent of the UN's programming right now in Afghanistan There are ways to directly and bilaterally fund international organizations who can then work with our local partners and Disproportionately it is women-led organizations that are struggling the most in accessing this funding in the current format Melissa Thank you. I mean, I don't have much to end this bit. I fully agree with a with Samira We really see that in the project donors, you know contracting a UN agency contracting an international NGOs contracting a national NGOs and at each of this layer you get overhead costs that are being kind of Spent It's really been one of our big focus especially on gender like for example care in Afghanistan We have six local partners who are woman-led and so we've really been working also on the capacity building not just for the project But making sure they actually are able to access international funding themselves, which is very challenging everything related to you know Due diligence audits all of the reporting we have to do to the donors now So it's definitely also being one of the main asks we've been pushing here in Washington asking for more Flexible and direct funding to local organization who are able to better deliver or more cost-efficient And also are better in bad in the communities and know the needs and the ways of delivering Sometimes better than international NGOs and UN agencies. Thanks. Thanks to me some of this seems like win-win Aspects I mean donor funding is constrained Let's let's make the most effective cost effective and effective use of it possible Thank you for the forbearance of the audience we've been having this panel discussion now I'll will will ask some of the panelists to respond to some questions that have been raised and Apologies in advance that we probably won't be able to get to all questions, but let's start now the first question is Is is interestingly and it's not from somebody in US IP, but it's a peace-building question and How do you you know with this humanitarian and development? Issue the development sort of lack and shortfall the humanitarian situation is there any way to pursue peace building as as a related and as an agenda as part of this conflict reduction We certainly know that the big war is over, but there are lots of local conflicts That come up from time to time the Taliban have been very harsh and from their perspective, I think successful in in controlling the country, but a lot is happening and maybe Maybe starting this time. Let's go again with Samira and then Melissa just in the local level Do you find ways to ease conflict is is there any ways to inject the peace-building? Issue into some of your work and and again, let me stress This is not my question. This is not US IP asking this question. It's from ICAW Well, you know, we we don't work on peace-building programming at the International Rescue Committee in Afghanistan our main Programming as has been discussed is in the areas of life-saving response But also some development work addressing livelihood concerns I think before we can talk about the peace-building question We have to address the engagement elephants in the room In order to do peace-building you have to engage with the authorities There is no way to do peace-building without engagement and I think oftentimes especially here in DC There is this perception that engagement means collaboration and that's certainly not the case There are 40 million Afghans that still live inside Afghanistan Engaging on a daily basis with the Taliban whether that is Driving down the street through a checkpoint whether that is paying taxes on your salary Whether that is getting, you know, necessary IDs and paperwork. We engage flying into the airport We will be engaging with the Taliban in a couple weeks or next week for Melissa Going into Afghanistan We have to engage with them to implement our programming to to be able to get access For our female staff to go to work. This is all forms of engagement so I think we need to Really drill down into what we we think engagement is and how can we expand on this to better address the needs of the Afghan people Thank you very good point about engagement and I I would certainly Emphasize that from my own economic perspective. I think organizations like the World Bank the IMF and others Need to be engaged without recognition without necessarily direct financial support But engagement is really critical and and you tied it in with peace-building. So Maybe you're a peace-builder too Melissa Yeah, no, I fully agree. I mean it is something we do on a on a daily basis I was in Pakistan two weeks ago. I went to meet with the local deputy director of economy I ask, you know, like can I can I meet with my woman public and they come to the office and we find we find ways to To find solutions together, especially when we focus on the humanitarian situation We all have the same interests, which is we need to make sure that the Afghan population can get some Can get humanitarian aid. So we are having this dialogue at local level at national level It it is definitely Sometimes challenging conversation, but it's only by talking with de facto authorities that that we are able to find solutions Especially in terms of of access in terms of delivery of aid There's a related question Which I'll also ask and it's it's an important question I think particularly in donor capitals, but also first, I mean, are you facing any constraints in terms of your organizations engagement and Perhaps even more important than that if you're not facing too many constraints How do you feel that the particularly the UN which is based there and is has a mandate to engage with authorities? Are they supporting the kind of work you're doing? Are they helpful or are they sort of whatever absent I Think you know for for our organizations the only game in town for the last two years has been humanitarian So we have been forced to engage from day one To reach as many clients reach as much as the population as we can So we you know we are our staff are from the communities that they serve, right? They some of the authorities are from the communities that we are serving those interpersonal relationships have been key for us In terms of engagement we have been meeting with you know authorities at all levels I have met with authorities at all level from the district level to the cap to the provincial to the capital level Sustained and continued dialogue has been key to allow us to continue to implement our programming in the country In terms of whether or not other agencies have that same sort of reach Again most of their programming is implemented by us So we are the ones actually for the most part in the communities getting these exemptions Implementing programming reaching those who are the most vulnerable across the country. So that has situated us I would say in a way where It's easier to have those difficult conversations. That's not to say it's it's been easy overall You know these restrictions and constraints are there. It is a very difficult operating environment But we are trying to look for as many innovative and creative ways to to get around some of this Thank you, and Melissa maybe for you also the same question, but Pushing it more. I mean when you run into problems, do you get support from? From I guess it would be mainly be the UN they're based there Although there are a few donor offices also in Kabul. I mean, do you feel you're adequately supported or you might need more support? So especially since the band there's been really a push for us to Engage with de facto authorities as a united humanitarian community. It has been laid by the humanitarian coordinator And so he has been leading on behalf of the humanitarian community to go negotiate exemptions to address access constraints And so it definitely has been one of the Point that allowed us to address some of the some of the constraints To give you an example there has been an issue in the province of Hord for the past few months and We have been able to respond as as as a united humanitarian community by suspending for example to give enough space and time for the humanitarian coordinator to go engage and negotiate and find a solution for all of the Organization to then resume working once a you know once the constraints had been had been addressed Maybe you know other points that are previously touched on a little bit is Finding angles and ways that allows us to have a constructive dialogue with de facto authorities So for example when we're talking about a delivery to woman when we're talking about women Empowerment again, not or even the bands not taking the angle of women's rights Which automatically kind of like shuts down the conversation, but really talking about the benefits that everyone In the country has from these programs from disengagement whether it's in terms of economic development Whether it's in terms of you know like the taxes that are paid from salaries or women economic activities And all of the positive impact this has on the communities and the families Thank you very much. I'll turn to Khaled for this question particularly since he's been in the US recently, but As we all know I think there are Concerns about aid helping the Taliban and I'm wondering if you could just say a little bit about that Aid and broad and they get to include other things like the ARTF IMF support Possibly even the reserves which everybody Talks about endlessly. Are there ways that I mean is it realistic to Things that aid can completely avoid helping the Taliban or are there kind of ways? It it it can be handled that that would at least minimize that Yeah, so the the the short answer is no, it's not possible to fully Safeguard aid from going into Taliban's it has been going in the last, you know during the 20 years of Republic They would have their informal taxation on NGOs to to trade all of it and I Assume it would continue until there is aid, but but there are ways in which you could Minimize this I think starting with Indirectly, but a very important point is on on Accountability and reporting if you cannot find a single Consolidated report on how much aid has been spent in the last two years in Afghanistan You have to go to individual UN agency sites and you would have to compile it But then you would have different timelines and you it's impossible to get a one Figure so starting with with that, you know when you have that that situation even for donors who are not Present enough on a son, but giving a lot of aid like the US government. It's it's impossible to to hold UN Agencies international NGOs national NGOs accountable to to anything so I think a baseline would be to make sure that there is timely accurate reporting and consolidated reporting on on on all of this But there are mechanisms through which you could Channel aid, you know why I spoke a bit earlier and Samira elaborated on ARTF and the World Bank doing direct Contracts with these international NGOs. It happens everywhere. They don't have to go through a government if there is no Recognized government you can you you can use Direct contracting you don't have to go through a UN agency that then has its own mechanism So you will add complications over complication So there are there are ways through which a aid Could be spent better Engaging communities is as important, you know, that's you are not accountable only to the donors, but the people To whom the aid is intended more engagement with those communities brings a lot of transparency and and acts as a mechanism where a effectiveness of that aid or humanitarian Initiative is is engaged there are on Overall engagement, I think just to be a bit of critical of my previous employers the World Bank and IFIs have been a bit Too cautious, you know, you can't claim to to have your mission as eradicating poverty and then 30 million people are starving and you just think it suffices to to to Channel funds through ARTF to UN and then that's your your responsibility is is over You need you need to engage as as Samira said I believe in engagement with Taliban as much as it might not be the Ideal outcome you need to engage to to put the pressure keep the pressure constantly on on them and and Then be in the country do the tough work of going sitting down with them Making sure you know some some of the programs go ahead as as you intend them rather than just making a transfer from Washington DC to UN account in New York and and then your responsibility is done. I think also for overall Economic surveillance IMF has a role to play and they have they bring a set of Skills that no other institutions have you you're not Dealing with with a simple humanitarian Situation, you know, it's a complex Economic situation that needs to look at fundamentals of economics, you know And you have to to look into them where this is the engine of growth. What can be done? How can you engage private sector and to? Into this this all to to to improve it So I think you know that there are ways but it needs a bit more initiative more engagement more Underground presence by by the big actors Thank You Khaled More technical question, I think related to Supporting private businesses is this Can you do it under humanitarian business this relates to the whole point of private businesses and women led businesses Which you've talked about Can you do that under humanitarian funding or is there some way to do it and also how do the? Taliban authorities Do you react you'd already address this a little bit Melissa? But maybe you know when you're talking about women's economic empowerment women led businesses women led I guess businesses because women led NGOs by definition are not allowed to because they're not allowed to be employed Right by NGOs, so maybe Melissa first and some year on this issue and one other technical question Sorry to throw them all at you, but I realized we're we're soon running out of time has the ban on foreign currency use of foreign currency by the Taliban impacted any of your activities particularly direct cash Interventions and if so are there workarounds? So maybe Melissa first sorry, that's a bunch of questions, but these have been very good questions from the Participants, thank you, and I'll try to be brief On the private businesses support especially you can add women businesses I think we quite limited both in terms of the scope of the project and and the size of them And we also not working on the macroeconomic level We can only help the woman who is setting up her business and what I see a lot when I meet with them is like they're very happy about the support We got the training we got for example like the machine to do the embroidery and all but the economies in a stage where they don't have clients anymore For example, so we are able to kind of like do our part to support these small businesses But then until the economy is supported and he's able to restart they came They went from like having ten clients a week before August 2021 to now having maybe one to two clients a week So they are not also able to to sustain themselves in that sense Then when it comes to them to the foreign currency It was very challenging for NGOs to operate in the first few months after the regime change And I think there was a lot of frustration at the time because the donors were very supportive We had a humanitarian crisis we were able to respond But the main problem we had at the time was how can we actually you know get cash into the country to to implement all of these all of these programs Since then the situation really improved especially when we're looking at OFAC Sanctions exemption when we can get UN sanctioned exemption as well for humanitarian work. So in that sense That coupled with the US UN cash breach allowed us to go back to more or less You know normal operation when it comes to cash flow payment of salaries of vendors and all of that So the work done on that front by the US government by ZU-1 has been very impactful quick follow-up on that and then Samira that you actually get funds in cash dollars or in Afghanis and do you distribute them to? beneficiaries and Afghanis or cash dollars For the UN cash breach we get it in US dollars for AIB bank And then we are able it depends you know like for some of the salaries a payment would be in USD And when we do cash distribution it does have to be in in Afghani I won't go into details because that's not my area of expertise Samira over to you Not my area of expertise either but I could touch up on it a bit I'll go to the first question in terms of the private sector You know due to the economic situation and government restrictions Surprisingly, we've seen the Afghan women's labor participation doubling During the course of the last two years More women according to this recent World Bank survey more women are working Right now, but it is in precarious Forms of employment in irregular employment There are ways there's opportunities again And that's because more and more of the population has fallen into poverty more and more women are forced to leave the homes To go out and work to try to put food on the table There are ways to support the private sector beyond you know the smaller scale Examples that Melissa was giving but we have women led businesses or women owned businesses that are medium and large Taxpayers in the country. They employ thousands of women across the country Their biggest impediment to their the success of their business and to continuing to grow and support women Are the banking challenges right now? They are unable to do swift transfers They are unable to purchase goods and import and export at the scale that they should be able to So without addressing the bigger economic concerns, there's You know again, it's a band-aid solution when we're talking about supporting the private sector And in terms of the cash shipments again, we it's like Melissa said we receive it in USD We it's a mixed bag. Sometimes we pay our contractors or employees in in USD But and then distributions vary with regards to that and in terms of ban on foreign currency We're still utilizing and using USD across the country as Was the case prior to 2021 you can go to the shop pay with USD and get afts back One of the challenges that we did face During the last two years was was the issue of the Afghani bank notes And the US government was very helpful in facilitating and allowing for the payment of the bank notes Which were printed in Europe to come back to to to come into Afghanistan, which really I think did improve the economic situation Particularly for women and girls as a woman when you go to the shop They give you the worst of the notes And if you're a man you get the better quality notes So worse, you know it did that was also having an impact on the purchasing power of women and girls in the country Thanks yet yet another aspect where women and girls are disproportionately affected Which I think people wouldn't normally think of but the bank notes quality is a serious issue I hope that they continue to issue new ones and again This is an area where I think Khaled mentioned you need a macro policy You need a monetary policy in this kind of deep recession horrible recession The the normal prescription would be to issue more Afghani money within reason not letting the exchange rate get out of control So so these are the kind of things where which actually would be helpful and Certainly having enough notes I I think there's still probably problems because that was only one big shipment and now there need to be more But replacing the old notes and modestly increasing the money supply are obvious Things yeah, so many issues and I realize we're pretty close to out of time. You've been patient Let let me take a question about what would it take for the Taliban to finance social Social services and the very good example, of course is the provincial hospitals where as As an emergency I think ICRC picked up that but it had been previously paid by the Ministry of Public Health as part of the national budget Khaled could correct me if I'm wrong and so so as an emergency mechanism ICRC took that over now, of course the With money shortage ICRC is not going to be necessarily Continuing that and the obvious thing would it be go back to the Ministry of Public Health like it was before August 2021 apparently that's been refused You can debate about the Taliban budget They spend about the same on security and defense as the previous government did but that's that was a war then right and Now there's not so much open fighting so but I guess my response to this question, which is a very good one is No, I mean there's there's almost nothing that can be done to get the child the Taliban to fund social services that I can think of their their Strategy is to to preserve their control to maintain unified as a movement and they've done You know, they've done the right things for an authoritarian regime control of security forces control of revenue Which as Khaled said they've taken over and we didn't talk about it They've actually collected about as much as the previous government, which is really an accomplishment in in a weak economy They've really restricted capital flight. So these dollars coming in they're not all going out of Afghanistan Like they like happened under the previous government They're they're ending up and the Taliban are actually having some reserves even though the main reserves have been frozen and so so they've done a lot of Good things from their own Perspective of an authoritarian regime and and not including necessarily caring for their own people Sorry, that will be my loan not moderate or intervention, but maybe In in the same order that we went I'm realizing the time is out, but maybe Khaled any final points and then Samira and Melissa Just just to conclude I think This session should have provided you with statistics and and Reasoning why Afghanistan still matters and it's important because the sheer number of people suffering is too big to ignore for the world and I hope there is continued support to Afghanistan and there is continued assistance in the short term on humanitarian but also development because right now there is no other Mechanism that could substitute for For the humanitarian assistance that this provide being provided had it not been for the humanitarian assistance despite its shortcomings the situation could have been much much worse and In the bigger scheme of things and the bigger scheme of Global economy and an international aid For five billion dollars is not a big big amount for the world to to be able to pledge to Afghanistan And I hope that that it continues Thank you. Just to add on to what Khaled was just saying You know we talked about the humanitarian crisis The US government in particular Has been generous and it's funding over the course of the last two years despite the political Limitations that are in place they have allowed us to reach as I said more clients than we have ever reached before they have Prevented this funding has prevented a famine in the country, but it needs to be sustained It needs to be continued and we need to look at alternative mechanisms of funding And development funding as we alluded to throughout this conversation But none of that is possible unless we have a Pass forward in terms of dialogue continued engagement with the authorities as Actors on the ground we have to do that, but there needs to be Further engagement with the authorities through whether it's the World Bank the IMF Different institutions diplomatic missions whatever it may be to to make it easier for us as actors on the ground To deliver aid in a principled manner to reach as many Afghans in need as possible So, thank you. I'll just stop there Thank you Maybe at some arises a pressure on the Afghan population and humanitarian organization is huge at the moment From the donors from the communities from the de facto authorities And we really at like like my colleagues mentioned at a time where there's really a Responsibility for the international community to recommit to the Afghan population especially Afghan women and girls and making sure that They do not suffer because of some of the policies taken by by de facto authorities So it's really crucial today that donors are able to commit when we're looking at the US government in particular we do know that Whatever's US government will be deciding will influence also other decision by other donors. So thanks a lot. Thanks bill with you Thanks very much, and I won't try to summarize this very valuable meeting I believe the recording will be available on USIP's website So others and outside participants can look at it again later I mean, I think one a few themes that came out of this are engagement engagement engagement Not talking about recognition or financial support directly or anything like that, but just Engaging is essential Maintaining aid I would slightly caveat that with my own view that try to have a gradual decline in aid rather than a sudden one The sudden one happened in August 2021 and it took enormous efforts to prevent a very serious famine and the situation now will be Even greater call even worse call it briefly mentioned and we didn't really cover it But the Taliban's opium ban is now like another economic shock And so if you have one billion shock there one billion in reduction in aid You're going to again plunge the economy into basically what was at risk in August 2021 and And also to shift the balance of funding whatever funding is available Away from pure humanitarian toward development and I would argue for creative approaches in this way try to reduce overheads basically change the way of doing business and I think I think there are There are some grounds to be hopeful There was one question which we didn't take up in the panel because it was so contrarian, but but With There are There are possibilities. I'll just mention one is that Ida funding from the World Bank Afghanistan's normal access to that would be in the range of 200 to 300 million dollars a year every year since August 2021 it's been losing that money and I think that that is something that should be addressed along with ARTF and and Changed an additional approach to ARTF. So I think there are some positive potentials as I believe all the panelists said Khalid particularly emphasized there needs to be a little bit of courage and engagement from the donor side as well to support these People who are really doing amazing work on the ground in Afghanistan So let's close just with a round of applause to our panelists and to the NGOs working