Economic Relief for Kandahar Cooperative Members

So many of us have been stunned and distressed by the sudden turn of events in Afghanistan. So many of us are desperate to help ordinary Afghans, especially those who risked their lives to support our military and humanitarian efforts there. But what to do? If you have been asking yourself this question, we hear you. So have we. In our case, the anguish is acute: We worked there for years. So we’re making this appeal. Please consider a contribution to a modest survival fund for the friends and former colleagues who worked with us – Sarah Chayes and Jennie Green – at the cooperative we set up in Kandahar more than a decade ago. At Arghand, men and women together crafted beautiful skin-care products from local nuts, seeds and botanicals. (You can read about its early days in this Atlantic article Sarah wrote.)

But, after weathering Covid, this latest blow was too much. Arghand, of course, is now closed, its former employees increasing desperate.

These are real people whom we’ve known personally for years. We can vouch for them – their dedication, their work ethic, their foibles, their sense of humor even when bombs were going off every day. We got to know many of their families, ate in their homes, held their newborn babies. Now they are stuck inside an increasingly hostile and terrifying Kandahar under Taliban control where whatever savings they might have had are being rapidly consumed by their efforts to stay alive against incoming tides of political upheaval and economic collapse. House-to-house searches are underway, bodies showing up among the grapevines.

Several of our friends have gone into hiding. This involves moving around frequently, sleeping in different locations on different nights, and certainly not working in shops or other public places. Banks are open, but account holders cannot withdraw more than $200 US per week. There are food shortages and spiking prices. Municipal offices are closed. It has become next to impossible to obtain a visa even to enter Pakistan, and the scene at the border crossing is getting lethal, as people try to force their way across.

The house of one former cooperative member was destroyed in crossfire as the Taliban were taking the city last month. “Red fire everywhere,” is how he described it. It took him two days to find his children, who had walked several miles to the home of a relative. Another former cooperative member – a delightful young woman fresh out of high school when she worked with us – is now a thirty year-old mother of three. Her husband has a form of cancer called clear cell sarcoma which took his left thumb, then the whole forearm. Now there is a massive tumor under his left armpit. They have a doctor that can do more surgery and administer more chemotherapy, but he too needs money. Our friend was working at a local hospital to support the family throughout much of her husband’s illness, but is now afraid to leave the house. “Our economy is zero,” she told Jennie in a text message over Whatsapp a few days ago, “and this cancer has taken everything away from us.”

For those who would like to know more about Arghand, here is some context. Sarah founded the cooperative in 2005. She had covered the fall of the Taliban for National Public Radio, then stayed on to help rebuild the country. We used locally sourced almonds, apricot and pomegranate seeds, and fragrant herbs that grew in the desert to produce high-end soaps and moisturizers for export to the United States and Canada. It was a beautiful project whose primary goals were to expand the market for licit agricultural products while at the same time creating living-wage jobs for Kandahari men and women.

Jennie joined Arghand in 2006 and served until 2011 as its Director of North American Operations. This meant navigating the transport and distribution of our bath and beauty products to small independent retailers throughout the United States and Canada. During that time we received donations from ordinary people and grants from the U.S. and Canadian overseas development organizations, USAID and CIDA, which enabled us to build out a small, solar-powered factory in downtown Kandahar.

In 2012, we turned operations over to an Afghan director, effectively working ourselves out of a job – which had always been our intent.

But no such organization could weather what has just happened. Most of our former team are desperate to leave Afghanistan; yet there are no exit ramps off this particular highway into hell. For the past month we have been collecting documents and submitting visa applications, to no avail. Sarah has leveraged her connections with high ranking U.S. and U.K. officials, but was unable to get anyone she knows onto any of those much photographed evacuation planes. Now, despite promises made by U.S. government officials to NOT abandon the Afghan civilians who risked their lives daily to partner with our soldiers, relief workers and nation builders, it is becoming increasingly clear that all but a select and fortunate (and sometimes random) few have, in fact, been abandoned.

We can’t live with that. We asked a whole generation of Afghans in the prime of their lives to believe in us, to support us, to partner with us, and many of them did – not always because it was politically or economically advantageous for them to do so (often it was the opposite) but because they trusted our promise of a better future, and the ethos we tried to uphold at Arghand. That future has since been erased, and Afghanistan has already slipped off the front pages while our friends live in terror of a knock on their doors at night.

Unable for now to get them out of the new Islamic Emirate, we want to provide some economic relief while they tackle the impossible, which is to get on with their lives in a society that seems determined to crush them. To do this, we need your help. Even with skyrocketing prices, U.S. dollars go a long way in Afghanistan. Our goal for this campaign is $42,000, which should be enough to support six families for almost a year, and also to absorb some medical expenses.

Those of you who know either of us know that this story is true. You know that we will get the money directly and immediately to our former cooperative members. For those who don’t know us yet, take a look at what Sarah has posted on her website: www.sarahchayes.org, or google her and Arghand. We are who we say we are. We will behave honorably – and keep you updated. This is our pledge.

We send you our heartfelt thanks for your attention and consideration.

Sarah Chayes and Jennie Green