27 May 2008
Former Afghan Land Mine Experts Retrain for New Employment
Vocational training will help Afghans retool, rebuild after decades of war
Washington -- Some workers gain long tenure in one particular job. Sometimes serendipity occurs when a job is done so well that the need it addressed no longer exists and a worker has to find a new career.
That is happening to hundreds of Afghans who have had the dangerous, painstaking mission of removing deadly land mines and other unexploded munitions.
They have been employed for years by two regional nongovernmental organizations that specialize in mine removal projects. The Demining Agency for Afghanistan (DAFA) has been working in the southwestern provinces of Afghanistan since 1990, focusing on high-priority areas around the city of Kandahar as well as in the provinces of Helmand, Zabul and Ghazni. The Mine Clearance Planning Agency (MCPA) is a newer Afghan nonprofit that has been conducting mine-clearing operations since 1997. MCPA estimates that some 1,500 Afghan villages once were riddled with mines, and many now have been rendered safe.
Afghanistan first was beset by mines when the former Soviet Union occupied the country from 1979 to 1989. There were other subsequent culprits, including pro-Soviet Afghan forces and the Taliban, which left behind unexploded ordnance and other explosive remnants of war.
In 2002, a Red Cross official said 100 Afghans were injured or killed from abandoned munitions each month. In addition to taking their toll on humans, mines have hampered reconstruction efforts and agricultural recovery.
Afghanistan had been one of the most severely mine-contaminated countries in the world. But James Madison University’s Journal of Mine Action -- which tracks mine clearance efforts worldwide -- reports vastly improving conditions as a result of the Afghan government’s determination to pursue a clear strategy.
The United States has contributed more than $175 million in mine action assistance to Afghanistan since 1993. The United Nations, the European Commission, other donor countries and private groups also have marshaled aid and assistance.
Since 1989, more than 1.3 billion square meters of Afghan land has been cleared of mines and explosives left over from decades of war. This success is attributed to the courage, dedication and expertise of thousands of Afghans who helped return their country to normalcy. In pursuit of that goal, many died while working in one of the world’s most dangerous professions.
AFGHANS CLEAR MINES AND THEN REAP A PEACE DIVIDEND
But now, after successful clearing efforts, some Afghans face another daunting prospect: unemployment. With land mine removal fast becoming an obsolete job, the men need new skills to qualify for jobs in today’s market.
Kabul and Washington were anxious to find new work for the land mine removal experts so they would not be tempted to drift into the grasp of anti-government groups. Consequently, the State Department decided to fund a vocational training center in Kandahar, where students take workshops with hands-on projects to master vocational skills.
The program, sponsored by State’s Bureau of Political-Military Affairs, began offering training in August 2007 in the plumbing and electrical trades. Masonry, carpentry and painting skills also are taught there.
The initial grant was for almost $200,000. The program even equips the former mine removal experts with the professional tools they will need for their new lines of work.
Tracey Begley, who is a program manager with the American nongovernmental group Landmine Survivors Network, stressed the importance of retraining workers who have put so much effort into removing mines in their communities. It is fitting, she told America.gov, that organizations are retraining Afghans to do another kind of work so that they can be gainfully employed.
The first group of unemployed Afghans graduated in January 2008 with certificates and tools in hand. Kandahar National Television publicized their availability for new jobs. DAFA has helped with employment assistance as they transition.
Peter Villano, the Afghan program manager in the State Department’s Office of Weapons Removal and Abatement, said a number of mine removal experts have been employed successfully in their new vocations. But he told America.gov that job placement “remains challenging, due to the difficult security and economic environment” in and around Kandahar.
The second set of 195 mine removal experts, formerly employed by MCPA, are enrolled in three workshops at the Kandahar center under a second State Department grant for nearly $200,000. Afghans who have some word-processing skills and knowledge of English are receiving administrative and computer training in that program.
Those who do not have that knowledge hone their fledgling carpentry skills by repairing old, broken furniture. As they gain more advanced carpentry skills, the Afghans will build door and window frames. The masons soon will be building walls and ceilings.
Begley said it is “just” that these men, who essentially worked themselves out of their jobs, are not being abandoned to the ravages of the local economy and are being given a new set of skills “so that they can contribute to the society that they have already helped improve.”
Brick by brick, window by window, these determined Afghans are learning the peacetime skills that Afghanistan needs after so many decades of war.
For more information about U.S. policy, see the Web site for the Office of Weapons Removal and Abatement.
