Photo: (C)n Burgos (flickr)

Opium is widely recognized as a major obstacle to economic development and postwar reconstruction in Afghanistan. It's estimated that Afghanistan currently produces between 90 and 95 percent of the world's opium. It's an approximately US$4 billion industry that accounts for just over half of the country's total GDP. And, according to Newsweek, most of that money goes to traffickers and corrupt officials. The average opium grower makes only US$300 a year.

What is to be done? The numbers indicate that the U.S.-led counter-narcotics program, which focuses primarily on poppy eradication, has been unsuccessful. Opium production has skyrocketed since the Taliban's overthrow; the UN reported a 34 percent rise from 2006 to 2007. Other programs that look to curb opium production by providing farmers with other crops or alternative livelihoods have also had limited success.

An international security-and-development policy group thinks there's an unexplored option. The Senlis Council is advocating a "Poppy for Medicine" program in which individual Afghan villages would be licensed to turn poppy into morphine, rather than heroin. In theory, this program would allow existing opium crops to be diverted into legal markets for medical painkillers.

In theory, this sounds workable. Similar projects have been successful in India, Thailand, and Turkey. But standing in the way of implementing the same program in Afghanistan are two probably insurmountable obstacles — one political and one economic.

The Afghan government opposes opium's legalization; the crop is banned by the country's constitution. Then there's a report from Britain's Royal Society of Chemistry, which says there simply isn't sufficient demand for opium for medical purposes. Afghanistan poppy growers would have to corner the market on medical opium — and then double it — to sell out their crop.

Photo: Shirine Bakhat/Mercy Corps

You would think that female access to education within one country would be roughly the same. Not so for Afghani girls trying to get ahead.

Radio Free Europe explores the deep inadequacies in education offered to female Afghani students. Educational opportunities are vastly different for female students in northern provinces and their female counterparts in southern Afghanistan.

The problem emerges not only from a lack of funds, but increasing lack of security due to the Taliban's presence in the south. Schools have been burned down by members of the Taliban and female teachers terrorized or killed.

The connection between education, female economic empowerment and poverty alleviation is essential and the growing inability of female students in the south to access safe educational opportunities worrisome.

Read the article and also check out what Mercy Corps is doing in Afghanistan.

Kabul, Afghanistan. Photo: twocentsworth (flickr)

China has entered the business of producing and selling burqas-- and Afghani women are responding to the "modern" designs. With the resurgence of the Taliban and violence, many women are choosing (or being forced to) cover up. The result is that China's new industry is driving out the traditional Afghani burqa industry.

Check out the Wall Street Journal article and video about China's growing presence in the burqa industry from this week's Post Global.

Photo: Shirine Bakhat/Mercy Corps

Today's Christian Science Monitor has a hopeful piece on female entrepreneurs in Afghanistan.

The success of Sediqi and a handful of other Afghan businesswomen come amid difficult circumstances, despite steady growth in the overall economy. In the face of a resurgent Taliban, stagnant reconstruction, and the high-profile kidnappings of foreign aid workers, these women push forward, propelled by entrepreneurial grit and desire to support their families. While no official figures track their numbers, they can be found in pockets of Afghanistan, launching consultancies, furniture factories, and printing houses. Many of them say better business conditions, rather than more talk of their plight, are critical.