Afghanistan Reconstruction: Despite Some Progress, Deteriorating Security and Other Obstacles Continue to Threaten Achievement of U.S. Goals
Released: 2005-07-28T00:00:00

Letter

Background

Afghanistan is a mountainous, arid, landlocked country with limited natural resources, bordered by Pakistan to the east and south; Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and China to the north; and Iran to the west (see fig. 1). At 647,500 square kilometers, Afghanistan is slightly smaller than the state of Texas; its population, estimated at between 24 and 30 million, is ethnically diverse, largely rural, and mostly uneducated. The country is divided into 34 provinces.

Afghanistan is one of the world’s poorest countries. As table 1 shows, development indicators published by the World Bank and the UN rank Afghanistan at the bottom of virtually every category, including nutrition; infant, child, and maternal mortality; life expectancy; and literacy.

Over the last two decades, political conflicts ravaged Afghanistan (see fig. 2). Factional control of the country following the withdrawal of Soviet troops in 1989, coupled with the population’s fatigue of fighting, allowed a fundamentalist Islamic group, the Taliban, to seize control of the country. Although the Taliban regime provided some political stability during the late 1990s, its destructive policies, highlighted in its repressive treatment of women, and its continuing war with the opposition Northern Alliance further impeded international aid and development.

In December 2001, less than 2 months after U.S. and coalition forces forcibly removed the Taliban regime, a 9-day international summit in Bonn, Germany, established a framework for a new Afghan government. This framework, known as the Bonn Agreement, focused on writing a new constitution by the end of October 2003 and holding democratic elections by June 2004. The agreement was endorsed by the UN Security Council on December 6, 2001, through UN Resolution 1383.

In December 2002, the United States passed the Afghanistan Freedom Support Act of 2002, authorizing increased assistance to Afghanistan. The U.S. goal is to firmly establish Afghanistan as a democratic nation inhospitable to international terrorism and drug trafficking and cultivation, at peace with its neighbors, and able to provide its own internal and external security. U.S. efforts in support of this goal are intended to help create national security institutions, provide humanitarian and reconstruction assistance, and reinforce the primacy of the central government over Afghanistan’s provinces. The act strongly urged the President to designate a coordinator within the Department of State to, among other things, be responsible for (1) designing an overall strategy to advance U.S. interests in Afghanistan; (2) ensuring program and policy coordination among U.S. agencies; (3) coordinating assistance with other countries and international organizations; and (4) ensuring proper management, implementation, and oversight by agencies responsible for assistance programs.

The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) provides U.S. assistance to underdeveloped countries through UN agencies, nongovernmental organizations, and private contractors. The main organizational units responsible for managing USAID’s reconstruction programs and operations in Afghanistan in fiscal year 2004 were the agency’s mission in Kabul, Afghanistan; the Bureau for Asia and the Near East; and the Bureau for Democracy, Conflict, and Humanitarian Assistance through the Office of U.S. Foreign Disaster Assistance, Office of Food for Peace, Office of Transition Initiatives (OTI), and Office for Democracy and Governance. Other U.S. government agencies provided additional assistance, including DOD through its provincial reconstruction teams (PRT) located at sites throughout Afghanistan. In fiscal year 2004, the 12 U.S.-led PRTs ranged in size from 60 to 100 civilian and military personnel, including civil affairs units, force protection soldiers, and representatives of the Departments of Agriculture and State and USAID. The teams are intended to deliver assistance that advances military goals and enhance security, to increase the reach of the Afghan central government in the provinces and allow assistance agencies to implement projects.

In spring 2003, DOD, recognizing the lack of progress in the U.S. effort in Afghanistan, drafted a political-military strategy for Afghanistan. The strategy did not include reconstruction. The strategy was vetted by the National Security Council and approved by the President in June 2003. At the time, Department of State and USAID officials drafted a plan to increase funding and expedite reconstruction efforts, particularly in infrastructure, democratization and human rights, and security. This plan served as the basis for the Accelerating Success in Afghanistan Initiative announced by the U.S. government in September 2003. The initiative was designed to be implemented in advance of the Afghanistan Presidential elections scheduled for June 2004. The U.S. government planned to provide $1.76 billion for the initiative, targeting approximately $1 billion of this amount for elections, major and secondary road construction, health and education programs, economic and budget support to the Afghan government, senior advisors and technical experts, and private sector initiatives. The remaining $700 million was to fund efforts to build the Afghan National Army, train and equip the police force, expand the counternarcotics program, and establish rule of law.

U.S. Spending in 2004 Focused on Reconstruction

In fiscal year 2004, the focus of U.S. spending in Afghanistan shifted from humanitarian and quick-impact assistance to reconstruction. Of the nine U.S. government departments and agencies involved in assistance to Afghanistan, USAID provided the largest amount of nonsecurity-related assistance. The largest investment went to USAID’s infrastructure sector, which received approximately half of the agency’s total obligations for Afghanistan in fiscal year 2004. About two-thirds, or $922 million, of USAID’s obligations supported local projects in Afghanistan’s 34 provinces, with Kabul and Kandahar provinces receiving approximately 70 percent of these funds, mainly for roads. The United States provided the largest share of international assistance to Afghanistan, contributing about 38 percent of the $3.6 billion that the international community pledged for 2004.

U.S. Spending Shifted to Longer-Term Reconstruction

The focus of U.S. spending in Afghanistan in fiscal year 2004 shifted from humanitarian and quick-impact assistance, such as building wells, to larger- scale reconstruction. The U.S. government obligated about $1.4 billion and spent approximately $720 million on nonsecurity-related assistance to Afghanistan; the largest percentage of this amount was spent on reconstruction, especially infrastructure projects. In contrast to fiscal years 2002-2003, when more than three-fourths of U.S. spending was for humanitarian and quick-impact assistance, approximately 75 percent— about $538 million—of the 2004 expenditures supported reconstruction and development projects. The remaining amount was spent on humanitarian and quick-impact projects. (See fig. 3)

USAID Provided Most U.S. Funding

Of the U.S. government departments and agencies providing assistance in Afghanistan, USAID spent the largest amount, about $587 million, for reconstruction, humanitarian, and quick-impact projects. The Department of State spent the next largest amount, about $70 million, primarily for assistance to refugees. DOD spent approximately $45 million for nonsecurity-related assistance, chiefly small projects through the Commanders’ Emergency Response Program. Six other U.S. government agencies also provided some assistance to Afghanistan in fiscal year 2004. (See fig. 4 for agency percentages; for more details, see app. II.)

About half—$497 million—of USAID’s fiscal year 2004 obligations for reconstruction in Afghanistan supported the rebuilding of infrastructure. This amount includes $448 million obligated for large infrastructure projects, such as roads, of which USAID spent approximately $236 million. To build schools and clinics, USAID obligated $49 million, of which it spent less than $6 million. USAID and DOD obligated $44 million and $47 million, respectively, through the PRTs, mainly for small-scale infrastructure projects.

Kabul and Kandahar Received Most U.S. Assistance

In an effort to expand the reach of the Afghan government—a major U.S. and Afghan government priority—USAID directed about two-thirds, or $922 million, of its obligations to local projects in Afghanistan’s 34 provinces, with Kabul and Kandahar provinces receiving approximately 70 percent of these funds (see fig. 5). The remaining funds went to national programs, such as government reform initiatives. USAID directed the majority of the funds obligated for Kabul and Kandahar—approximately $527 million of a total $647 million—toward road construction. In addition, DOD distributed approximately $47 million throughout the areas covered by the PRTs, the majority of them near Afghanistan’s border with Pakistan.

United States Remained Largest International Donor

As in previous years, the United States provided the largest share of international assistance to Afghanistan, contributing about 38 percent of the $3.6 billion pledged by the international community for 2004. (See fig. 6; for 2004 pledges by donor, see app. II.) The U.S. share for 2001-2003 was about 34 percent of the approximately $9.7 billion pledged by the international community. According to the Center on International Cooperation, as of February 2005, donors had obligated about 29 percent, or $3.9 billion, of the $13.4 billion pledged since 2001.

U.S. Assistance Benefited Afghanistan, but Accelerated Reconstruction Did Not Meet All Targets

U.S. humanitarian and quick-impact assistance benefited vulnerable populations and returning refugees; however, the success of efforts to accelerate large-scale reconstruction varied. USAID provided almost $60 million in emergency assistance, including food aid, and the Department of State provided about $60 million to assist refugees in fiscal year 2004. In addition, the U.S. government obligated approximately $120 million for small-scale, quick-impact projects such as the construction of wells and bridges. Further, the United States accelerated its major reconstruction programs to increase visible progress before the 2004 Afghan presidential elections. However, progress and results in each of the reconstruction sectors—agriculture, democracy and governance, economic governance, education, health, infrastructure, and gender—varied, as did the problems each sector faced.

U.S. Government Responded to Ongoing Humanitarian Crisis

In fiscal year 2004, the U.S. government provided food and other emergency assistance to Afghanistan’s vulnerable populations and assisted the return of refugees. Afghanistan suffered its sixth year of drought and produced a below-average harvest, and the percentage of people in need of food aid rose from 20 percent in 2003 to an estimated 37 percent in 2004. In addition, approximately 900,000 refugees returned to Afghanistan, with more expected to return in coming years owing to the closing of refugee camps operated by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in Pakistan.

USAID’s Office of Food for Peace, through the UN World Food Program (WFP), provided Afghanistan with 79,330 metric tons of wheat and other emergency food assistance (valued at $49 million) in fiscal year 2004, which equaled approximately 25 percent of the international food assistance that WFP requested during that time period. In addition, USAID, through its Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance, provided almost $10 million in other emergency assistance in fiscal year 2004, compared with $137.8 million in fiscal years 2002 and 2003. According to USAID, the office supported transitional shelter for refugees; the return of internally displaced persons; winter programs, such as snow clearance and road rehabilitation; and emergency funds to respond to the ongoing drought.

The Department of State’s Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration (PRM) provided almost $63 million to help refugees, compared with $234 million in previous years. PRM provided more than half of the 2004 funding through the UNHCR to support traditional assistance, such as shelter and education for refugees. In addition, the agency facilitated out-of-country registration and voting so that Afghan refugees living in Pakistan and Iran could vote in the October 2004 Afghanistan presidential election. PRM also provided funds through the International Committee of the Red Cross and UN Children’s Fund, as well as about $17 million in direct grants to nongovernmental organizations. These grants provided shelter, water and sanitation, health care, education, and economic assistance and training to refugees and internally displaced people. PRM provided funding for the construction of 5,900 shelters; however, as of September 30, 2004, 8,000 shelters were still needed.

USAID and DOD Continued Quick-Impact Efforts

In fiscal year 2004, USAID and DOD continued efforts to respond rapidly to small-scale reconstruction needs in Afghanistan. USAID launched the Quick-Impact Program (QIP), supplementing the activities of the existing Office for Transition Initiatives, and DOD launched the Commanders’ Emergency Response Program (CERP) to operate alongside its Overseas Humanitarian, Disaster, and Civic Aid (OHDACA) program (see table 2). The aims of these programs is to extend the reach of the Afghan central government through benefits to rural communities and to facilitate the transition to longer-term reconstruction programs. Although CERP and OHDACA funds address humanitarian needs, the projects are determined by the tactical need to obtain the support of the populace and are primarily tools for achieving U.S. security objectives. Since 2002, the U.S. government has programmed almost $136 million for about 3,600 small- scale, quick-impact projects through USAID and DOD.

CERP and QIP funds worked in tandem through the PRTs in fiscal year 2004, with CERP funding smaller projects costing less than $20,000 on average and QIP funding larger, more expensive projects. DOD regulations allow PRT commanders to approve the use of up to $25,000 in CERP funds for the rapid implementation of small-scale projects, such as providing latrines for a school or a generator for a hospital. USAID representatives at PRTs used QIP funds for larger, more complex projects such as local roads, bridges, and government buildings. To ensure accountability and long-term sustainability, USAID regulations require that the mission, before granting approvals for QIP projects, conduct technical assessments and ensure Afghan government involvement in projects. DOD does not require similar assessments for CERP-funded projects.

Progress in Accelerated Reconstruction Projects Varied by Sector

Efforts to accelerate existing USAID programs in each reconstruction sector—agriculture, democracy and governance, economic governance, education, health, and infrastructure—achieved varying degrees of progress toward project objectives and accelerated targets. Efforts to promote gender equity in each sector also demonstrated varying levels of progress.

Although the 2004 Accelerating Success initiative targets for the agriculture sector were generally met or exceeded, the contractor failed to integrate project activities, thus limiting the project’s results. To address the needs of the agriculture sector, USAID implemented the Rebuilding Agricultural Markets Program in 13 of Afghanistan’s 34 provinces, concentrating the program’s activities on physical infrastructure, rural finance, and agricultural technology and market development. USAID signed the program’s $153 million primary 3-year contract on July 3, 2003. The contractor, Chemonics International, Inc., was to use a “market chain” approach to improve the operations of, and linkages between, the market chain components (i.e., farmers, processors, transporters, input suppliers, creditors, regulators, wholesalers, and retailers).

As of September 2004, Chemonics had implemented numerous activities through subcontracts and grants with 40 organizations, including local and international nongovernmental organizations, private firms, and international organizations. The progress of these activities as reported by Chemonics is as follows: Physical infrastructure. By September 2004, over 320 kilometers of irrigation canals, approximately 230 irrigation structures, and about 160 kilometers of farm to market roads had been rehabilitated. In addition, nearly 120 market structures such as retail market stalls and grain and vegetable storage sheds had been constructed.

Rural finance. Over 1,100 loan officers had been trained, and more than 8,000 loans had been disbursed.

Agricultural technology and market development. About 565,000 farmers were served by extension services; over 4,000 women being trained in poultry management; over 20,000 chickens had been distributed to women; and more than 3,675,000 livestock had been treated, vaccinated, or both.

Data provided by Chemonics and U.S. government interagency performance reports indicated the program generally met or exceeded all of the Accelerating Success targets established for the sector; however, the program did not address a key program objective. We found that Chemonics had not integrated individual activities to achieve project objectives or focused its efforts on the improvement of market chains. USAID and Chemonics officials told us in October 2004 that although many activities had been implemented, most projects were stand-alone agricultural infrastructure efforts (e.g., road and canal rehabilitation) and did not focus on improving the marketing of commodities or the integration of market chain components. Consequently, during its first 15 months, the project’s progress in strengthening Afghanistan’s market chain was limited. An internal evaluation of the Chemonics effort was conducted by USAID mission staff in Kabul in mid-fiscal year 2004. The evaluation resulted in the development of a new strategy and performance monitoring plan in an effort to refocus RAMP and better integrate program activities.

USAID’s democracy and governance program produced notable successes, particularly its assistance with the creation and ratification of Afghanistan’s constitution and with the presidential elections. However, some civic education programs were uncoordinated and had limited distribution. USAID’s fiscal 2004 democracy and governance program comprised three components: Strengthening of elections and political process. The Consortium for Elections and Political Process Strengthening component addressed civic education and political party building. Under USAID’s Accelerating Success initiative, the consortium’s funding ceiling increased from $3.76 million to $13.36 million. Grantees reported training more than 2,000 district and village leaders in civic education, registering 46 political parties by the end of fiscal year 2004, and establishing eight election training and information centers.

Judicial reform. In May 2004, under the Accelerating Success initiative, USAID increased its contract with Management Systems International (MSI) from $14.7 million to $16.8 million. USAID also revised the scope of work to focus on judicial rehabilitation and added court administration as an objective. MSI provided technical assistance and logistical support to the constitutional commission and its secretariat and to the constitutional loya jirga that took place in December 2003. According to USAID and MSI reports, MSI also built or rehabilitated 7 of 10 targeted courthouses by September 30, 2004; helped review, draft, and track the status of legislation; surveyed and compiled laws and legal texts; mapped courthouse administration functions; and conducted training for about 300 legal professionals.

Loya jirga and elections logistics. USAID awarded the Asia Foundation a cooperative agreement to provide operational and logistic support for the constitutional loya jirga and elections. The award’s funding ceiling increased from $10 million to more than $45 million. The scope expanded to include assistance to the UN Assistance Mission to Afghanistan to conduct the loya jirga, register voters, and hold the presidential election. The foundation filled unforeseen gaps in the UN’s efforts, as UN staff faced security restrictions that limited their ability to register voters and set up polling stations. According to the UN, more than 10 million people registered to vote, out of a total population of between 24 and 30 million; about 40 percent of those registered were women.

Despite these successes, the program faced setbacks, particularly in public education and courthouse construction. Parts of the civic education program were poorly timed. According to an evaluation commissioned by a USAID grantee, a listening device to enhance the public’s understanding of the election process was distributed late, in some cases just 1 week before elections and with no training, making it difficult for users to listen to all of the content; the evaluation found that users would have preferred to have received the device 2 months before the elections. In addition, there were delays in the project’s initiative to draft and pass legislation, due to shifting responsibility for legislative drafting from the Judicial Reform Commission, a temporary entity, to the permanent Ministry of Justice. Finally, despite a goal of building or rehabilitating 10 courthouses by the end of fiscal year 2004, according to USAID and contractor reporting, only 7 were completed due to late funding.

Despite many achievements, problems pertaining to the selection of advisors and sustainability affected the economic governance program. In December 2002, USAID signed a 3-year, $39 million Sustainable Economic Policy and Institutional Reform Support program contract with Bearing Point, Inc., to provide technical assistance and training to the primary Afghan ministries concerned with economic governance issues. In April 2004, as part of the Accelerating Success initiative, USAID increased funding for the contract to $95.8 million. Most of the work under the contract was implemented by advisors and operations staff assigned primarily to the Ministry of Finance and the Central Bank. As of August 2004, approximately 224 advisors were working within the Ministry of Finance. Some of the advisors worked directly with the management of the ministry, others served in operational positions and were responsible for carrying out the day-to-day functions of the ministry. According to the USAID mission in Kabul, USAID’s Inspector General, and an evaluation commissioned by the Afghan government, Bearing Point made progress toward completing the approximately 120 “contractor responsibilities” listed in the contract. Accomplishments included the following: Fiscal reform. Bearing Point developed a system to estimate government revenues; introduced a taxpayer identification number system; trained Afghans to develop and monitor budgets; established a national payments system; developed a customs broker licensing program, reformed customs operations and trained customs officials; rehabilitated and equipped customs houses and border posts; and developed a database of customs revenues.

Banking reform. The contractor helped the Afghan Central Bank establish national and international operations via standard banking telecommunications networks, implement bank licensing policies and procedures, restructure and equip branch banks, and draft banking laws.

Trade policy. The assistance provided helped the Afghan government streamline its business license application process, reducing the time to obtain a license from months to less than 1 day and reducing the number of required signatures from 58 to 6. In addition, the contractor also assisted the government in reviewing and drafting commercial decrees and laws.

Legal and regulatory reform. The contractor assisted Afghan ministries in drafting key laws and establishing a telecommunications regulatory body.

Privatization. As of October 2004, little work had been conducted in the area of privatization, because the Afghan government was not ready to privatize state-owned enterprises.

Despite these accomplishments and USAID’s efforts to adjust the program to meet the government of Afghanistan’s needs, the Ministry of Finance remained dissatisfied with the cost and quality of the assistance provided by some of the expatriate advisors hired under the contract and sought to terminate it. In mid 2004, the Afghan government requested a review of the program. The first evaluation, completed in September 2004, found that, among other things, Bearing Point lacked an effective means for determining ministry needs. USAID disagreed with the evaluation’s findings and maintains that Bearing Point worked closely with the ministries receiving assistance and worked proactively to meet their needs. According to the Central Bank governor, the bank—the other major recipient of assistance under the contract—was generally satisfied with the assistance provided. In November, the Ministry of Finance agreed to allow the contract to continue until its completion date, December 2005.

In addition, in October 2004, the Minister of Finance and the Governor of the Central Bank were still concerned that their agencies would not be able to sustain operations after the program’s completion. To address this concern, USAID and Bearing Point initiated plans to transfer local Afghans working as their contractors to Afghan civil service. These individuals would be paid with funds provided by the international community through the Afghanistan Reconstruction Trust Fund. In addition, the Central Bank began testing the abilities of its staff on a periodic basis to determine their ability to work in the absence of international advisors and to identify areas where additional training was needed prior to the Bearing Point contract’s completion.

USAID’s Afghanistan Primary Education Program (APEP) provided educational and teacher-training programs to help improve basic education; however, under the Accelerating Success initiative, very few schools were constructed and other components were not integrated into educational facilities as originally envisioned.

USAID’s education program originally focused its efforts in four areas: textbook production and distribution, radio-based teacher training, accelerated learning, and school construction. USAID provided the bulk of its education assistance in Afghanistan through APEP, run by Creative Associates International, Inc. APEP was designed to ensure that newly constructed schools were functional centers of learning by providing textbooks, skilled teachers and opportunities for accelerating the learning of over-aged students. The Accelerating Success initiative increased APEP’s funding ceiling from $16.5 million to $87.6 million, but it decoupled the provision of materials and training from school construction. The initiative introduced three additional components: in-country textbook production; educational support services to help reform policies, systems, and programmatic changes; and enhanced monitoring and evaluation. Progress under the APEP contract included the following: Textbook production: According to the USAID Regional Inspector General, USAID exceeded its textbook production goal for 2004, producing about 16.5 million books, but distribution was delayed.

Radio teacher training: According to the targets in the original APEP contract, the radio teacher training broadcasts aimed to improve the teaching skills of about 30,000, or about 96 percent of all primary school teachers by the end of 2004. Under the Accelerating Success initiative, the goal was reduced to reaching up to 40 percent of Afghan teachers nationwide. After a mid-2004 survey of, primarily, participants in U.S. education programs, USAID concluded that 70 to 90 percent of all primary school teachers were listening to the radio teacher training broadcasts and the number of listeners was increasing monthly.

Accelerated learning: APEP’s goal was to raise the educational levels of 80,000 over-aged students in 13 provinces and move them into age- appropriate levels by the end of 2004. Under the Accelerating Success initiative, the goal was expanded to 170,000 students in 17 provinces. Under both plans, APEP intended 70 percent of beneficiaries to be female students. By the end of fiscal year 2004, USAID had met its student enrollment objective, but less than 60 percent of students enrolled were girls.

School construction: According to contract and grant documentation, targets for school rehabilitation or construction shifted under the Accelerating Success initiative from 50 schools to 286 schools by the end of 2004. By September 2004, implementing partners reported that 77 schools had been refurbished and 8 were substantially complete.

Educational support services: Under the Accelerating Success initiative, APEP began to provide the Ministries of Education and Higher Education with advisors to help draft education law, improve planning capacity, and assess English language instruction needs.

Monitoring and evaluation: Under the original contract, APEP produced weekly or biweekly updates, quarterly progress reports, and an evaluation of the radio-based teacher training component. The expanded scope includes a national study of students trained under the accelerated program.

USAID also instituted several other smaller education-focused projects in 2004. These included a $10 million teacher-training institute and literacy initiative and an $11 million dormitory to house between 1,100 and 1,500 university women in Kabul.

Despite some accomplishments, the project’s ambitious program made it difficult to meet targets on many fronts. To address health sector issues, USAID’s Rural Expansion of Afghanistan’s Community-based Healthcare (REACH) program, in conjunction with the Ministry of Public Health, established a nascent health care system and provided health services and training for health providers. USAID’s REACH program, implemented by Management Sciences for Health (MSH) under a 3-year contract, was designed to improve the health of women of reproductive age and children younger than 5 years. USAID’s Accelerating Success initiative increased MSH’s original ceiling of approximately $100 million to $129 million. The initiative expanded the scope of work to include, among other things, tertiary care in addition to the project’s original focus on rural health care. USAID and MSH noted progress in five health care areas. The progress in these areas as reported by MSH is as follows: Health care facilities and community outreach. The program reached its stated target of awarding $53 million in service delivery grants to more than 250 clinical facilities in 13 provinces. Service in these facilities covers a population of approximately 4.8 million.

Training for rural health care providers. The REACH program did not meet its fiscal year 2004 target of training 46 midwives and 2,060 community health workers. By the end of 2004, according to Management Sciences for Health reports, 75 midwives were in training in Kabul, although none had finished the course, and almost 1,500 community health workers had been trained.

Public health education programs. REACH developed a policy on health education with the Ministry of Public Health and helped the ministry develop standard health promotion messages. Management Sciences for Health reporting also indicated that REACH produced seven radio dramas and trained 21 ministry and radio staff in radio programming.

Ministry of Public Health capacity. REACH developed a national health management information system and played an advisory role in health sector reform, financing, and planning, as well as hospital management. The REACH program helped to create a new human resources department in the health ministry and to review and update the national human resources policy for health staff. REACH also contributed to the development of the National Drug Policy, the National Medicine Agency, and donation guidelines for drug and equipment donors. According to a midterm evaluation of the program, REACH’s efforts have been sustainable.

Clinic construction. According to contract and grant documentation, targets for clinic rehabilitation or construction shifted under the Accelerating Success initiative from 50 clinics to 253 clinics by the end of 2004. By September 2004, implementing partners reported that 15 clinics had been substantially constructed and none had been refurbished.

USAID’s ambitious health care program stretched the capacity of contractors, making it difficult to implement many projects simultaneously. For example, according to the December 2004 USAID-commissioned midterm evaluation, despite targets established in 2003, few clinics had communication materials designed to change the health-related practices of Afghans and most clinics remained focused on curative, rather than preventative, care. Further, the evaluation found that despite a greater need for community midwives than for hospital midwives, REACH developed the capacity to train equal numbers of hospital and community midwives. In addition, although the development of a national infection prevention program was added to the Accelerating Success initiative, the program’s schedule was delayed by 2 to 3 months owing to a delay in finding a program manager.

USAID’s infrastructure program focused on some of Afghanistan’s large infrastructure needs, including construction of the primary highway and emergency electricity provision to four cities; however, progress has been limited. USAID designed the Rehabilitation of Economic Facilities and Services (REFS) program, to promote economic recovery and political stability in Afghanistan by repairing selected infrastructure. To ensure sustainability, USAID also designed REFS to strengthen pertinent institutions’ management capacity, and to strengthen Afghan construction companies’ ability to build according to international standards. The Louis Berger Group, Inc., implemented most of the infrastructure work through 2004 under the 3-year REFS contract. Under the Accelerating Success initiative, USAID increased REFS’ funding from $143 million to $665 million and added 12 new awards with a collective funding ceiling of almost $400 million.

USAID’s fiscal year 2004 infrastructure programs included the following: Primary roads. USAID completed the first phase of the construction of the Kabul-Kandahar Ring Road, which decreased travel time between the two cities from several days to 6 hours. The second phase—adding layers of asphalt, bridges, culverts, shoulders, and signage—was to be complete by October 2004, but repair work continued into 2005. USAID also mobilized contractors and started survey work to begin the next section of the road, from Kandahar to Herat.

Secondary and urban roads. By fiscal year 2004, work had begun on one urban road in Kabul, diverting traffic away from the U.S. Embassy, and one secondary road to provide access between Kabul and a southern city, Gardez. In addition, according to contractor reports, planning or construction of nine additional secondary roads began; however, by the end of fiscal year 2004, four were postponed due to lack of funding.

Power. To increase the power supply around Kandahar in the south, USAID began rehabilitation of two turbines for the Kajaki Dam. By the end of fiscal year 2004, USAID was negotiating for construction of a third turbine as well as seeking a solution to a power shortage in Kabul. In the meantime, USAID supplied emergency power to Kabul, Kandahar, Lashkar Gah, and Qalat by providing fuel for generators at the cost of approximately $3 million per month.

Irrigation. USAID began work on several irrigation projects: the emergency rehabilitation and reconstruction of the Saur-e-haus Dam, spillway, and diversion channel; rehabilitation of the Zana Khan Dam; the Sardeh Irrigation System; and three intake systems. By the end of fiscal year 2004, construction of the Sardeh Irrigation System and two of the intake systems had been completed.

Water/wastewater. By September 2004, USAID had contracted for water availability assessments for two planned communities and for water system assessments and design upgrades for three provincial capitals.

Schools and clinics construction. In the initial infrastructure contract with the Berger Group, USAID included the construction or rehabilitation of 40 schools and clinics as an illustrative target to be achieved by the end of 2003, with an additional 60 buildings to be completed by the end of 2004. The actual job orders signed in July 2003 show that the Berger Group agreed to complete 55 schools and 78 clinics. By the end of September 2003, only 1 building was completed. USAID reduced the Berger Group’s responsibility to 105 buildings and in May 2004 provided grants to five additional organizations, with the goal of rehabilitating or constructing a total of 774 buildings by October 31, 2004. In mid-2004, owing to, among other things, the education and health ministries’ insistence on producing new as opposed to refurbished buildings and a lack of progress by all implementing partners, USAID, according to grant and contract documentation, reduced its expectations to about 530 buildings and extended the completion deadline to December 2004. By the end of fiscal year 2004, the implementing partners reported having refurbished 77 buildings and substantially completed new construction of 23 buildings.

Because the Accelerating Success initiative emphasized visible construction, in addition to time and funding constraints, USAID largely abandoned the REFS contract’s objective of building Afghan ministry capacity in 2004. The Berger Group had recruited and hired experts to supply intellectual capacity at the ministries of Public Works, Irrigation, Health and Education; however, this project was discontinued in June 2004.

Although U.S. agencies focused on 10 of the 13 women-centered objectives legislated by Congress, the overall impact of these efforts has not been measured. (See app. III, table 17 for progress on objectives.) Unlike programs for most reconstruction sectors, no overarching contract was let to implement women-centered programs. Instead, U.S.-funded programs incorporated components that advanced the social, economic, and political rights and opportunities of women, dedicating about $196 million to such initiatives. For example, USAID provided more than 90,000 girls with education equivalent to one or more grade levels through the APEP accelerated learning program and trained community health care workers and midwives through REACH. USAID also provided democracy and governance technical assistance, which helped over 3 million women register for, and vote in, the 2004 presidential elections. USAID also implemented other projects, such as reconstructing a women’s dormitory to enable more than 1,100 young women to attend university in Kabul, establishing a women’s teacher training institute, and, according to USAID, completing 3 of 17 planned women’s resource centers in provincial capitals. Other U.S. government agencies also incorporated women’s issues into their work. For example, the Department of State granted $75,000 to train four Afghan woman judges in civil and family law. Likewise, the DOD included “Principles of non-discrimination: Women in Society” and other pertinent classes in their curriculum for training the Afghan National Police.

In addition, the U.S.-Afghan Women’s Council was created to accelerate progress by promoting public-private partnerships between U.S. and Afghan institutions and mobilizing private sector resources to benefit women. The council raised about $135,000 of private sector funds from entities such as an America Online women executives group and Daimler- Chrysler. These funds supplemented various U.S. government projects, including training of women judges, the Afghan Family Health Book, and community banks and microfinance loans. Many of the other projects sponsored by the council, such as the Women’s Teacher Training Institute, were funded and managed through USAID. Whereas USAID’s reconstruction sector programs tend to target a broad range of women and have a national scope, many of the council-supported projects impact a small number of women.

Although U.S. legislation and assistance programs have included efforts to address the needs of Afghan women, as of the time of this report, no evaluation had been conducted to determine the overall impact of U.S. gender-related efforts.

Assistance Management and Interagency Coordination Problems Persisted

Problems associated with the management and coordination of U.S. assistance to Afghanistan occurred throughout fiscal year 2004. As in fiscal years 2002-2003, the persistence of project management problems affected agencies’ oversight of reconstruction contracts. U.S. financial data on assistance to Afghanistan remained fragmented and incomplete, and USAID continued to operate without a comprehensive operational strategy to guide its efforts. In addition, USAID did not always enforce required contract provisions, USAID directives, or a federal acquisition regulation necessary to hold contractors accountable for their performance. In addition, comprehensive performance indicators in most sectors were lacking. Consequently, decision makers in Washington did not receive meaningful information about the results of USAID–implemented projects. Problems with project monitoring also continued in 2004, and although USAID has taken steps to improve project monitoring, limited staffing and security restrictions reduced its ability to provide proper oversight for much of the fiscal year. Finally, although coordination of U.S. efforts occurred daily throughout 2004, the evolving roles of U.S. organizations and the coordination of international assistance were problematic.

Management Problems Impeded Oversight

During fiscal year 2004, a number of management problems negatively affected the U.S. agencies implementing reconstruction projects and prevented agency officials from providing project oversight. The tracking of U.S. financial data for Afghanistan assistance remained fragmented and incomplete. In addition, USAID continued to operate without a comprehensive strategy to guide its overall assistance effort. Contract management and performance measurement problems also impeded oversight. Finally, staff turnover and travel restrictions negatively affected USAID’s ability to provide regular on-site monitoring of project activities.

U.S. Governmentwide Financial Data Still not Readily Available

In fiscal year 2004, tracking of U.S. assistance financial data for Afghanistan improved but remained fragmented and incomplete. In June 2004, we reported that the Coordinator for U.S. assistance to Afghanistan, as well as others involved in the management of the assistance effort, lacked complete and accurate financial data for fiscal years 2002 and 2003. Because of the lack of accessible and timely financial data, program managers were hampered in their ability to, among other things, allocate resources and determine whether strategic goals were being met.

Although more information on assistance obligations was available in fiscal year 2004 than in previous years, U.S. agencies remained unable to readily supply complete and accurate financial data for programs in Afghanistan. There was no single, consolidated source of fiscal year 2004 obligation and expenditure data for U.S. assistance to Afghanistan. Consequently, as in 2002 and 2003, the embassy and the coordinator’s office continued to lack complete and accurate financial data to inform their decisions. According to the Embassy Interagency Planning Group, numerous organizations with little coordination or oversight track the U.S. budgetary process for assistance to Afghanistan, including obligation and expenditure data. To address this problem, the embassy created an interagency resource office in November 2004 to provide better visibility over all U.S. assistance financial matters in Afghanistan.

USAID Strategic Guidance Still Lacking

As in previous years, USAID operated in fiscal year 2004 with an interim, rather than a more complete, standard strategy for its activities in Afghanistan. USAID directives allow the use of interim strategic plans in countries experiencing high uncertainty because of drastic political, military, and/or economic events. In June 2004, we reported that although the USAID mission in Afghanistan developed an interim strategy and action plan in August 2002, these documents did not clearly articulate measurable goals or provide details on time frames, resources, responsibilities, objective measures, or the means to evaluate results for each of the sectors targeted by the strategy, as required by USAID directives. The mission obtained yearly waivers allowing it to postpone developing a comprehensive strategy until February 2005. According to USAID officials, the mission did not complete a comprehensive strategy in fiscal year 2004 because it wanted to wait until the Afghan presidential elections had been completed and a new government formed. USAID officials informed us in July 2005 that a more comprehensive strategy had been completed and approved by USAID management in Washington, D.C. Although a new strategy was completed prior to the end of fiscal 2005, more than 3 years have passed between the time USAID began providing postconflict assistance to Afghanistan and the completion of a comprehensive USAID assistance strategy for Afghanistan. The lack of a comprehensive strategy impedes USAID’s ability to ensure progress toward development goals, make informed resource allocation decisions, and meet agency and congressional accountability reporting requirements on the effectiveness of agency programs.

Contract Management Problems Reduced Oversight of Contractors

Contract management problems affected most reconstruction sectors, making it difficult to hold contractors accountable. Oversight of the USAID assistance contracts for Afghanistan was essential owing to the inherent risks associated with the use of cost-plus-fixed-fee contracts; the awarding of contracts through bidding procedures that were not fully open and competitive; the large initial dollar value and scope of the contracts and large increases in the dollar values and scopes over time; and the requirement to demonstrate progress quickly.

Despite the need for strong oversight of USAID assistance contracts, we found that USAID did not provide adequate contract oversight, including holding contractors to stipulated requirements and conducting required annual reviews of contractor performance.

Agriculture. USAID did not hold its primary contractor to the contract’s requirement to conduct five crop subsector assessments that were to serve as the basis for the contractor’s annual work plans and all future activities. According to the contractor, it did not complete the assessments because USAID was pressing it to produce visible progress through the construction of, among other things, irrigation canals and farm-to-market roads by the Accelerating Success deadline. Although USAID documented the contractor’s lack of performance, as of October 2004, it had not required the contractor to complete the assessments.

Economic governance. USAID’s regional Office of Inspector General reported in August 2004 that, because the contractor failed to produce contractually required quarterly work plans and schedules, the Office of the Inspector General could not determine whether the economic governance program was on schedule to achieve planned outputs. According to the Inspector General’s report, USAID officials did not require the contractor to produce the plans, in part because mission staff in Kabul lacked time to review them. To correct this problem, the contractor began producing quarterly work plans and schedules in July 2004.

Infrastructure. The use of grants instead of contracts to accelerate the construction of some schools and clinics in fiscal 2004 made it difficult for USAID to hold grantees accountable, because no-penalty causes were included in the grant agreements. Further, neither USAID nor its initial contractor developed a quality assurance plan for the school and clinic reconstruction effort. Such a plan could have guided USAID’s oversight efforts and assisted in the identification of problems. Similarly, although the main infrastructure contractor was required to develop and submit a comprehensive quality control and assurance program for the Kabul–Kandahar Road construction project, this was not done. According to a September 2004 USAID Inspector General report, USAID did not inspect contract quality control laboratories until 21 months after road construction began. The Regional Office of the Inspector General also found deficiencies in the contractor’s quality control program, such as untrained personnel and lack of adherence to testing standards.

All sectors. Because of staffing constraints and competing priorities, USAID did not perform annual contractor performance evaluations in any sector as required by USAID policy directives in 2004 and federal regulation. The evaluations are intended to document contract quality, cost control, and timeliness; and inform future award decisions. According to USAID, five additional contracting staff were hired in early fiscal 2005 and efforts to conduct evaluations subsequently began. In addition, according to contract provisions, technical and contracting officers are to meet quarterly and annually with contractors to discuss performance and other administrative and technical issues. Although USAID maintains that staff met frequently with contractors throughout 2004 and conducted in-house reviews of some of the major programs, most meetings were ad hoc and records of the discussions were not always formally documented and reported. The absence of such records makes it difficult to determine the nature and extent of problems with individual contractors or across multiple contractors’ efforts. Such records would also facilitate conducting annual contractor performance evaluations.

Performance Measurement Problems Plagued Programs

The USAID mission in Kabul did not develop a performance management plan for 2004. In addition, performance information in several sectors was lacking, making it difficult to determine the results of USAID assistance. Finally, because of—among other problems—weaknesses in contractor reporting and the lack of a performance management system, the information reported by USAID to decision makers in Washington, D.C., did not accurately portray the status of each sector or the overall assistance effort.

USAID directives state that performance management represents the agency’s commitment to manage programs with greater accountability and that operating units must prepare a complete performance management plan to manage the process of assessing and reporting progress toward strategic objectives. However, since the mission in Kabul was operating under a wavier that permitted it to use an interim strategy rather than a more comprehensive strategy, it was also allowed to operate without a comprehensive performance management plan. Although a performance management plan was not required, USAID directives state that when an interim strategy is used, program performance should still be measured— country volatility may require intensive monitoring and measurement of program implementation. USAID officials stated that although a formal plan was not prepared, goals, indicators, baselines, and targets were included in major contracts. However, without a performance management plan that meets the requirements stipulated in USAID directives, USAID cannot develop a complete and accurate assessment of the status of its assistance efforts. The United States has pledged to maintain a long-term presence in Afghanistan, in part by increasing the number and scope of USAID contracts. Consequently, the need for a comprehensive plan and for the greater integration of performance measurement into the work of contractors will continue to be important in future years. Now that a new overall, longer-term strategy for USAID’s efforts in Afghanistan is approved, USAID has stated that the mission in Kabul will develop a performance management plan that complies with USAID directives.

Further, USAID directives state that performance data collection should be integrated with implementing contractors’ activities and incorporated into the contractors’ work plans. USAID did not stipulate the requirement for contractors to develop sector-specific performance plans in three of the six major reconstruction contracts. In two of the three contracts where a requirement was stipulated, little information on what should be included in the plans was prescribed. We found problems with performance measures in the following sectors: Agriculture. The contractor was required to report to USAID on the status of 14 performance measures. (See app. III, table 6 for a list of the measures.) However, the contractor did not collect or report information for most of the measures, making it difficult for USAID to accurately determine the extent to which the program was achieving expected results. Efforts were underway in June 2005 to improve agriculture-related performance measures.

Democracy and governance. In the grant awarded for civic education and political party building, USAID did not require the implementing partners to establish specific targets or develop performance management plans, making it difficult to assess whether the program was on schedule or achieving intended results.

Economic governance. For most of fiscal year 2004, the contractor did not develop performance measures, which would have helped USAID monitor the sector’s results. An Afghan government review of USAID’s economic governance program stated that the contractor had not developed a formal process for assessing advisors as required in the statement of work. Consequently, it was unclear how USAID or the contractor assessed advisors’ performance, determined whether the advisors’ knowledge had been transferred to Afghan counterparts (a key aspect of the program), or monitored the program’s progress. USAID officials stated that the program’s progress was tracked through weekly and monthly progress reports. We found that although these reports provided information on the status of activities, they did not contain specific performance indicators to determine the impact of the project. To correct this weakness, the contractor initiated efforts to produce periodic performance measures in the last quarter of fiscal year 2004.

Health. According to an evaluation of the health sector, the contractor’s data management system was unable to collate data from service delivery subgrantees into a comprehensive picture for the overall service delivery effort, making it difficult for managers and USAID to judge progress or results.

Owing to these weaknesses and other problems, the performance measures that the Kabul mission provided to decision makers in Washington, D.C., did not completely portray the status of each sector or the overall Accelerating Success initiative. For example, we found that the reported agriculture sector measures, such as kilometers of canal repaired, did not provide the information necessary to determine whether the program was meeting the primary objectives stated in the contract— increasing agricultural productivity and farmers’ incomes. Likewise, the only two measures where reported for the democracy and governance sector, the number of courthouses constructed, and the number of judicial personnel trained. Those measures did not capture the performance of the diverse activities implemented in this sector. Further, the data reported in some sectors did not always match contractor reports. For example, although contractor reports indicted that 77 schools were refurbished and 8 were substantially complete, reports provided to Washington indicated that only 39 schools had been constructed or rehabilitated.

Program managers need accurate operational information, including performance measures, to determine whether strategic objectives are being met. According to USAID officials in Washington, D.C., only 3 days were allowed for the development of the Accelerating Success performance measures. The measures were selected based on what USAID thought it could accomplish by the June 2004 target date rather than what was needed to determine progress and results in each sector. USAID conditioned meeting the targets on, among other things, the existence of a secure environment and the receipt of funding by July 2003. Neither of these conditions existed. USAID does not believe that the performance measures currently used are an effective way of measuring progress toward program objectives and plans to introduce more meaningful performance measures in fiscal 2006. The agency maintains that it is crucial to take into account lessons learned related to the difficulty of the reconstruction environment when developing future measures. (App. III presents information on the performance measures that were included in the main contracts for each sector and the Accelerating Success performance measures provided to decision makers in Washington, D.C.)

Lack of Staff and Security Restrictions Impeded Effective On-Site Project Monitoring

Throughout fiscal year 2004, staffing problems and security restrictions limited on-site project monitoring. Although the USAID mission in Kabul had more staff and better working conditions by late fiscal year 2004 than in previous years, staff levels and turnover continued to pose a challenge. Staff at the USAID mission in Kabul continued to manage a much larger amount of assistance than their counterparts at other missions. Specifically, as of June 2004, staff at the mission in Kabul managed approximately $27.5 million in assistance per staff member while counterparts at other missions managed $1.2 million per staff member. This ratio improved by September 2004 after USAID increased its staff from 41 to 101. In September, the ratio was reduced to about $11.2 million per staff person while the average across USAID missions remained about $1.2 million per staff person. Further, staff turnover in key positions continued in 2004. For example, the mission had three different directors in fiscal year 2004. Similarly, the agriculture sector had five different technical officers in 2004, owing to staff performance problems and delays in finding a permanent officer. According to USAID, the mission in Kabul also did not have sufficient staff in Afghanistan with the technical knowledge to monitor reconstruction projects. To increase technical knowledge, 10 members of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers were assigned to the Kabul mission by September 2004. To increase the recruitment pool for staff assigned to the USAID mission, in November 2004, USAID’s Administrator requested all staff to consider serving in one of four critical posts including Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, and Sudan. In addition, in order to attract and retain more U.S. direct hire staff for extended periods, USAID has increased pay incentives, such as hazard pay, cost of living, and overtime remuneration.

Security restrictions limited the travel of U.S. direct-hire personnel to program sites outside Kabul, making routine program monitoring difficult. In its April 2004 risk assessment of the USAID mission in Kabul, USAID’s Inspector General cited the inability to travel freely to project sites because of security concerns as a material weakness and an overriding constraint to managing assistance activities in Afghanistan. For much of fiscal year 2004, USAID staff had limited access to project sites and depended on reporting from its contractors and grantees. To improve project monitoring, USAID contracted with a nongovernmental organization to conduct site evaluations; however, the contract was not signed until May 2004.

Efforts to Improve Coordination of U.S. Activities and International Assistance Had Varying Results

Although coordination of U.S. assistance efforts occurred daily throughout fiscal year 2004, new initiatives to improve coordination of U.S. assistance in Afghanistan had mixed results. Also, despite efforts by the Afghan government to better coordinate international donor assistance, problems associated with the effectiveness of coordination mechanisms persisted in 2004.

U.S. Efforts Were Coordinated through Interagency Process, but Initiatives to Improve Coordination Had Mixed Success

U.S. assistance to Afghanistan in fiscal year 2004 was coordinated primarily through daily meetings of the Afghanistan Interagency Operations Group. The group included representatives from the Department of State’s Office for Afghanistan, USAID, DOD, and other agencies delivering assistance. According to Department of State officials, this formal, interagency committee provided a uniform process for making, and informing the President of, policy-level decisions and for sharing information among agencies. In Afghanistan, U.S. assistance was coordinated through the U.S. Embassy country team. (See fig. 14.)

The United States undertook several initiatives in fiscal year 2004 to improve coordination of U.S. assistance in Afghanistan. Specifically, the office of the Commander of the Combined Forces Command-Afghanistan (CFC-A) was moved to the embassy from Bagram Airbase (27 miles north of Kabul) to improve coordination between civilian and military efforts in Afghanistan. Further, according to embassy officials we interviewed and documents we reviewed, the Ambassador did not believe that the existing embassy management structure was sufficient to plan, coordinate, and monitor U.S. operations and did not have confidence in the accuracy of reconstruction assistance reporting. To improve reconstruction management, planning, and reporting, the ambassador created the Embassy Interagency Planning Group, staffed by military officers, to improve reporting on reconstruction projects, facilitate the development and execution of the Mission Performance Plan, and act as a liaison between the embassy, CFC-A, the Afghanistan Interagency Operations Group, and others.

The Departments of State and Defense also created the Afghanistan Reconstruction Group (ARG) in fiscal year 2004, recruiting private sector and other experts to serve as strategists to the Ambassador and as sector advisors to key Afghan government ministries. However, the group’s mandate, mission, roles, and responsibilities were not delineated or incorporated into the embassy’s Mission Performance Plan. In addition, according to ARG, USAID, and Department of State officials, the ARG focused its efforts on criticizing USAID programs rather than providing constructive advice. As a result, animosity developed between the ARG advisors and some USAID and embassy staff. According to USAID and Department of State officials we spoke to, some ARG advisors did not coordinate Afghan ministry meetings with embassy staff or inform them about the meetings’ results. State and USAID officials stated that because separate meetings were being held, Afghan government ministries sometimes received conflicting messages about U.S. reconstruction activities. Further, some USAID contractors became confused by ARG advisors’ efforts to direct the reconstruction effort. For example, ARG advisors responsible for economic governance issues tried to direct the activities of USAID’s contractor for that sector. To clarify lines of authority, USAID informed its contractors that they were to take direction from USAID alone. Most U.S. officials we spoke to in November 2004 stated that coordination with the ARG had improved; however, the roles and responsibilities of the ARG remained unclear.

To enhance reconstruction efforts, the U.S. government increased the presence in the PRTs of civilian personnel from the Department of State, USAID, and other agencies. By September 2004, about 13 Department of State, 8 USDA, and 13 USAID representatives were stationed alongside U.S. military personnel in PRTs across Afghanistan. However, in the absence of a common doctrine or set of best practices for incorporating civilian personnel, coordination varied depending on each PRT commander’s priorities and personal relationships with civilian agency representatives. In addition, we found that stationing civilian personnel in the PRTs did not improve oversight of Kabul-based projects. In general, USAID personnel at the PRTs focused on identifying, implementing, and coordinating PRT- based, quick-impact projects. Few USAID technical officers stationed in Kabul used the USAID PRT staff to help monitor reconstruction projects. We reported that in fiscal year 2003, neither USAID officers stationed in Kabul nor at PRTs were able to identify the location of many Kabul-directed projects in the field. This problem persisted in 2004 despite the addition of a Kabul-based USAID-PRT coordinator to facilitate logistics and communication.

Coordination Problems between Afghan Government and Donors Persisted

Despite some efforts by the Afghan government to coordinate assistance from international donors, problems associated with the effectiveness of coordination mechanisms persisted throughout 2004. The Afghan government established the National Development Framework and Budget and consultative groups to coordinate international assistance. The development framework and budget established broad national goals and policy direction for a reconstructed Afghanistan. The consultative groups were designed to assist in the planning and implementation of the national budget and to coordinate the international community’s independent efforts and political objectives. (See fig. 15.)

Afghanistan Development Forum (ADF) (National Budget)

Consultative Group Standing Committee (CGSC)

In June 2004, we reported that the coordination of international assistance and the consultative groups had not been effective. We found, among other things, that some donors independently pursued development efforts in Afghanistan; the international community asserted that the Afghan government lacked the capacity and resources to effectively assume the role of coordinator; the terms of reference for the consultative groups were unclear and too broad; the groups were too large and lacked strong leadership; member commitment was uneven; and the overall potential of the mechanism had not been maximized.

International coordination improved somewhat in 2004. The national Consultative Group Standing Committee met frequently; the Afghan government presented a consolidated national budget to focus international donations at the Afghanistan Development Forum; and more donors demonstrated increasing commitment to use the national budget to focus their assistance. However, the then Minister of Finance stated that some international donors continue to provide assistance based on what they want to provide rather than on the Afghan government’s needs.

However, problems with the consultative groups and USAID’s coordination with the Afghan government persisted in fiscal 2004. According to the then Minister of Finance, the consultative group mechanism had not matured into a real decision-making forum. More than 1 year after their creation, most groups met infrequently and 5 of the 16 groups had not yet developed terms of reference to guide their efforts. Others that did not produce results, such as the natural resources consultative group, were effectively disbanded. Although USAID participated in a number of the consultative groups, some coordination issues remained. For example, according to USAID officials there were extensive contacts between USAID, contractors, and ministry officials, and ministries had to approve building designs and site locations. However, officials from the Ministries of Education and Health believed they had been excluded from participating in the management of the construction of schools and clinics. Further, the lack of coordination among the Ministry of Health, USAID, and the REACH contractor to match clinic construction site selection with the location of health service delivery grant activities caused a significant barrier to expanding the basic provision of health services. The Minister of Agriculture stated that he was not regularly informed about the U.S. agriculture program’s progress and was unable to respond to public inquiries about the program, increasing skepticism as to whether any assistance was being delivered. Similarly, according to an evaluation commissioned by the Afghan government, the Minister of Finance and his department heads had little input into the initial identification and selection of some of the USAID contracted advisors and were dissatisfied with their qualifications and work.

Lack of Security, Opium Cultivation, and Funding Delays Obstructed Reconstruction and Threatened Achievement of U.S. Goals

In fiscal year 2004 Afghanistan’s security situation remained volatile and, in some parts of the country, seriously deteriorated. Attacks on assistance projects occurred throughout the year, resulting in project delays and the deaths of assistance workers. In addition, dramatic increases in opium cultivation continued to threaten stability in Afghanistan; efforts to reverse the trend, including the development and implementation of a U.S. counternarcotics strategy, began in late 2004. Further, delayed funding continued to hamper the U.S. assistance effort in Afghanistan. Most of the funding needed to meet June 2004 Accelerating Success initiative targets was not available until February, just 5 months prior to the target date.

Deteriorating Security Delayed Project Implementation, Fueled Instability

In fiscal year 2004 the security situation in Afghanistan was volatile and deteriorated in some regions. Attacks against aid workers, Afghan security forces, and international forces increased. According to U.S. security data and UN reports in August and November 2004, deteriorating security in the south and southeast caused large areas to be “effectively out of bounds to the assistance community” (see fig. 16). In the north—an area commonly viewed as the safest in the country—attacks resulted in the deaths of foreigners and Afghans. Direct attacks on UN compounds and convoys occurred in Kandahar, Konduz, and Hirat provinces as well as other provinces.

According to USAID, eighty-one people involved in assistance activities were killed in 2004. During fiscal year 2004, 70 attacks directly affected USAID programs, causing delays in reconstruction projects. For example, equipment was damaged, work was delayed, and construction workers were kidnapped, wounded, or killed by antigovernment forces attacking USAID’s highway construction project. In addition, secondary road projects, agricultural training programs, the distribution of vaccines and medicines, and the construction of schools and clinics, among other reconstruction projects, were delayed or terminated because of attacks. For example, school construction in Uruzgan, Helmand, Paktiya, and Ghazni provinces was at a standstill owing to security threats.

Stability across the country in 2004 was threatened by local authorities and military commanders who acted with impunity and were viewed as responsible for a wide range of repressive activities, including acts of intimidation, extortion, arbitrary arrest, illegal detentions, and extrajudicial killings and torture, according to the Department of State, the UN, and human rights groups. Factional fighting among warlords in seven provinces in the north and the west of Afghanistan continued in 2004, resulting in the deaths of at least 100 combatants and civilians. Although large areas of the country and some warlords remained beyond the control of the Afghan government in 2004, the Afghan government made some progress in asserting its authority. For example, the Afghan President appointed new governors in about half of the country’s 34 provinces. However, according to the Department of State’s 2004 human rights report for Afghanistan, the government or its agents carried out extrajudicial killings. For example, on August 14, 2004, 17 bodies were discovered at the Shindand market place, with evidence that 6 of the 17 individuals were tortured and beheaded.

The United States and the international community continued to take steps to improve security in Afghanistan. Specifically, DOD, coalition, and NATO forces increased the number of provincial reconstruction teams from 4 to 19 in 2003-2004 to enhance security for reconstruction activities. In addition, DOD accelerated its effort to train and deploy Afghan National Army combat troops. As of March 2005, 18,300 troops had been trained and 10,500 troops had been deployed to Kabul central command and 7,800 to four regional commands. However, efforts to equip troops and build supporting military organizations were behind schedule. Further, the United States and Germany had trained more than 35,000 police by January 2005, but the lack of infrastructure and equipment at the provincial and district levels, along with other problems, negatively affected police effectiveness. Finally, as of February 2005, about 40,000 of Afghanistan’s estimated 100,000 official militia forces had been demobilized; however, an estimated 65,000 to 80,000 unofficial militia fighters were still at large. The Department of State views the demobilization and reintegration of these forces as critical to improving the country’s security and succeeding in the international recovery effort.

Dramatic Increase in Opium Cultivation Threatens Stability

In 2004, dramatic increases in opium cultivation continued to threaten stability, reconstruction, and state-building in Afghanistan. According to the UN, Afghan drug production increased by approximately 25 percent between 2002 and 2004, owing to high returns, a growing market, rural poverty, political fragmentation, weak law enforcement, and deteriorating security. (See app. IV for 2002-2004 production and revenue statistics.) The UN estimated 2004 opium production at 4,200 metric tons, which represents almost 90 percent of the world’s illicit opium supply. Disease and drought kept the yield low; without these mitigating environmental factors, the U.S. government estimated that total production would have been more than 9,700 metric tons.

According to the Department of State, the UN, the Afghan government, and others, opium cultivation, drug trafficking, and associated financial gains are having an increasingly harmful influence on Afghanistan society. Specifically, some national level officials and many district and provincial government leaders have some criminal connection to the opium trade. With opium-related revenues equivalent to 50 to 60 percent of its GDP over the past 3 years, Afghanistan is on the verge of becoming a narco-state. The increase in opium production and trafficking is threatening reconstruction and state-building in Afghanistan, as well as the nation’s longer-term peace. It is undermining legitimate economic activities and the establishment of the rule of law and is responsible for supporting factional agendas and antigovernment elements, including warlords, local commanders, and terrorist organizations. The drug trade is also impeding the disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration of former combatants, because those involved in the drug economy are developing and funding private militias needed to run the drug business. Further, the unchecked development of an illicit narcotics-based economy, and the funds it provides to the entrenched interests of antigovernment elements in the provinces, exacerbates problems associated with the central government’s effort to extend its writ outside Kabul.

The Afghan government and the international community have taken a number of actions to address the narcotics problem in Afghanistan since the signing of the Bonn Agreement in December 2001. These actions have included imposing bans on opium cultivation, drafting counternarcotics strategies, establishing Afghan counternarcotics police organizations, and launching limited eradication efforts (see app. IV for more details). U.S. counternarcotics efforts in 2004 were led by the Department of State’s Bureau for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement (INL) Affairs. Additional assistance was provided by DOD. INL obligated $36.5 million primarily to eradicate poppies and provide alternative livelihoods and spent about $8.9 million, to assist the Afghan Government’s central eradication force. DOD obligated $25.7 million on counternarcotics efforts by October 2004 and spent about $8.9 million, to train and equip the Afghan Government Counternarcotics Police, build a public affairs capacity within the Ministry of Interior, and create a counternarcotics intelligence organization.

However, these and other counternarcotics efforts failed to have any significant impact on the cultivation and processing of opium in 2004 owing to limited security and stability across Afghanistan. For example, as of October 2004, efforts led by the Afghan, UK, and U.S. governments to manually eradicate poppy fields failed. In 2004, eradication efforts began after most of the country’s opium had been harvested, primarily targeted producers in only 1 of 34 provinces, and resulted in the eradication of less than 1 percent of the hectares cultivated. Meanwhile, although a number of clandestine processing labs were destroyed and limited quantities of opiates seized, no major narcotics traffickers were arrested, and piecemeal training and limited funding have impeded the development of Afghanistan’s Counternarcotics Police.

According to the Department of State, counternarcotics is now one of the top U.S. priorities. Between June and October 2004, a $776.5 million, five- pillar strategy, implementation plan, and budget for 2005 were developed. The budget would fund five areas: $299 million for eradication programs, $180 million for law enforcement, $172.5 million for interdiction, $120 million to provide legal livelihood alternatives for poppy farmers, and $5 million for a public information campaign.

The 2005 strategy faces a number of challenges that may limit its success.

The strategy calls for a robust eradication program that includes the use of aerial methods. However, the Afghan government vetoed the use of aerial eradication, making it impossible to affect large areas quickly.

During our visit in October 2004, the Governor of the Afghan National Bank stated that eradicating 30 to 50 percent of the country’s opium would have a destabilizing impact on the economy. He added that the U.S. government had not consulted the National Bank regarding the economic impact of eradication.

U.S. officials stated that funding for the overall U.S.-led effort was needed in January 2005, 4 months before the beginning of the harvest season, but some of the funding was not available until May 2005.

The interdiction capabilities of the Afghan government are rudimentary at best, because the government lacks the laws or legal infrastructure needed to investigate and prosecute drug-related crimes.

Delayed Funding Negatively Impacted Acceleration Efforts

Delayed funding continued to negatively impact the U.S. assistance effort in Afghanistan in fiscal year 2004. In our previous report, we noted that delays in fiscal year 2003 funding prevented USAID, in particular, from undertaking major reconstruction activities. As in prior years, most reconstruction money in fiscal year 2004 was provided through emergency supplemental appropriations, with smaller amounts in the agencies’ regular appropriations. USAID received reconstruction money through two appropriations (see fig. 17). In November 2003, Congress appropriated $672 million in emergency supplemental legislation; the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) apportioned $270 million of this funding to USAID in late January 2004 and $372 million in early February. In addition, Congress appropriated $283 million in January 2004 for USAID’s fiscal year 2004 budget for Afghanistan reconstruction. However, the first portion of these funds did not become available for programming by the USAID mission in Kabul until March 2004 owing to delays introduced by the apportionment processes within State, OMB, and USAID. All of these funds were for programs that, under the Accelerating Success initiative, had initial targets of June 2004, giving the agency approximately 3 to 6 months to demonstrate progress. According to USAID officials, to compensate for the funding delays USAID was forced to postpone the start or expansion of programs and move funds between programs to keep faster paced programs operating.

USAID continues to face funding delays in fiscal year 2005. In December 2004, Congress passed regular appropriations for the agency, matching USAID’s Afghanistan budget request of $397 million; USAID officials stated at the time that they would be unable to fully implement programs with the amount of their regular appropriations and would rely on supplemental funding to carry out the agency’s planned activities. However, the almost $1.1 billion fiscal 2005 emergency supplemental appropriation was not passed until May 2005. USAID, Department of State, and Afghan officials told us that it is difficult to plan and implement large development programs that depend heavily on the passage of uncertain supplemental appropriations.

Conclusions

Afghanistan has made progress since the fall of the Taliban in October 2001. As part of an international effort, U.S. assistance, led by USAID, helped Afghanistan elect its first president, return millions of children to school, and repatriate millions of refugees. Despite these gains, Afghanistan’s needs remain great. It ranks as the world’s fifth poorest country; half of all Afghans live below the poverty line and more than 20 percent cannot meet their daily food requirements. Further, factional elements remain in control of some areas of the country, perpetrating crimes against citizens, and insurgents continue to infiltrate the country. These conditions leave the nation at risk of once again becoming a threat to itself and others.

The U.S. has pledged to maintain a long-term presence in Afghanistan, including increasing the number and scope of USAID contracts. In 2004, the focus of U.S. support to Afghanistan shifted from primarily emergency assistance to reconstruction programs, with large scopes of work and costs, in an effort to accelerate progress. Despite its considerable investment in Afghanistan’s reconstruction, USAID struggled with contract management and project oversight. Although a long-term, country-level strategy was approved as of July 2005, USAID operated throughout 2004 without a comprehensive strategy. In addition, USAID has not developed a performance management plan to monitor project performance, nor has it focused contractors’ efforts on developing project-specific performance plans. Without such plans, the U.S. government cannot accurately assess the results of its assistance efforts. Consequently, decision makers in Washington and Kabul cannot effectively target resources to accomplish the goal of creating a stable Afghan society.

Recommendations for Executive Action

To improve on existing efforts to measure and assess the progress of U.S. reconstruction projects toward achieving U.S. policy goals, and to provide a basis for planning future reconstruction projects, we recommend that the Administrator of USAID take the following three actions (1) establish a performance management plan that complies with USAID directives, (2) clearly stipulate in all future reconstruction contracts that contractors are to develop performance management plans specific to the work they are conducting, and (3) more completely communicate the performance information obtained from the performance management plans to executive branch decision makers in Kabul and Washington.

Agency Comments and Our Evaluation

We provided a draft of this report to the Departments of State and Defense and to USAID to obtain their comments. The Departments of State and Defense declined to comment on the report. USAID commented that in general it found the report to be a comprehensive and detailed assessment of the U.S. civilian reconstruction efforts in Afghanistan during fiscal year 2004. USAID concurred with the report’s recommendations and indicated that it has made progress in improving its strategic planning and performance measurement processes. Specifically, USAID completed its first long-term country-level strategy for Afghanistan to cover the period from 2005 through 2010. The agency also indicated that it has begun developing a performance management plan. USAID also provided information on more recent activities and technical comments, which we incorporated where appropriate.

Copies of this report are being sent to the Secretary of Defense, the Secretary of State, the Administrator of USAID, relevant congressional committees, and other interested parties. We will also make copies available to others upon request. In addition, the report will be made available at no charge on GAO’s Web site at http://www.gao.gov.

If you or your staff have any questions about this report, please contact me on (202) 512-3149 or at gootnickd@gao.gov. Contact points for our Offices of Congressional Relations and Public Affairs may be found on the last page of this report. Other contacts and major contributors are listed in appendix V.

Objectives, Scope, and Methodology

The Afghanistan Freedom Support Act of 2002 directs GAO to monitor U.S. humanitarian and reconstruction assistance to Afghanistan. To meet the requirements of the directive and provide Congress with a comprehensive accounting of U.S. assistance to Afghanistan for the fiscal year 2004 period, we analyzed (1) U.S. obligations and expenditures, (2) the progress and results of U.S. humanitarian and reconstruction efforts, (3) the management of U.S. assistance and mechanisms to coordinate U.S. and international assistance, and (4) the major factors that obstructed the advancement of the assistance effort and the achievement of U.S. policy goals.

We collected data on fiscal year 2004 obligations and expenditures from the U.S. departments and agencies responsible for implementing U.S. government–funded projects in Afghanistan. These include the U.S. Departments of Agriculture, Defense, Health and Human Services, Labor, State, and Treasury; the Broadcasting Board of Governors; the U.S. Trade and Development Agency; and the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). Because no single repository contains financial information for all U.S. assistance in Afghanistan, we contacted each agency directly. For the Department of State, we contacted each bureau and office separately—the Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration; the Bureau for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs; the Office of Humanitarian Demining Programs; and the Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking In Persons—because the Department of State does not have a consolidated financial reporting mechanism for programs in Afghanistan that tracks both obligations and expenditures.

To distinguish funding for humanitarian and quick-impact projects from longer-term reconstruction funding, we requested the agencies to designate their funding appropriately. For USAID, we generally relied on the stated mission of the responsible funding bureau to determine the funds’ purpose unless the agency informed us otherwise. For example, we assumed that funding for the Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance and the Office of Transition Initiatives was generally used, in accordance with their respective missions, to address emergency situations and implement quick- impact projects; funds for the offices’ various long-term projects were clearly marked in the financial reporting that USAID supplied to us.

To delineate the distribution of funding and projects by province, we report information that USAID provided from a programmatic, rather than a financial, database. The financial database did not include data by location, and the programmatic database included only province-level obligation data. Because data on nationwide programs were not included in the programmatic database, we were unable to compare overall totals between the financial and programmatic databases to verify consistency. Also, because the programmatic database tracks only obligations, we were unable to determine USAID’s expenditures by province.

To assess the reliability of the obligations and expenditures data from U.S. agencies providing assistance to Afghanistan, we (1) interviewed officials at the Department of Defense (DOD), the Department of State, and the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) regarding their methods of gathering, management, and use of data; (2) reviewed USAID’s financial audit statement; and (3) compared the data we gathered with USAID’s Congressional Budget Justifications and State’s 150 account documentation, as well as with the governmentwide Afghanistan assistance compiled by State’s Bureau of Resource Management. According to a Department of State official, the data compiled by the agency’s Bureau of Resource Management are not complete, owing in part to differences in how the agencies track data, a disconnect between agencies’ Washington and Kabul offices, and variation in the frequency of reporting. However, the Department of State relies on these data for decision-making purposes and to report to Congress. Based on our assessment, we concluded that the data on obligations and expenditures we collected from each agency are sufficiently reliable for the purpose of showing, in gross numbers, the levels of U.S. nonsecurity-related assistance to Afghanistan in fiscal year 2004.

To assess the reliability of data for pledges by international donors, we (1) interviewed the Department of State official responsible for compiling these data based on information provided by the government of Afghanistan and (2) compared the data’s reliability with that of other information sources. We determined that the data are sufficiently reliable for the purpose of broadly comparing the United States’ contributions with those of other major donors and the combined total for all other donors. However, we noted several limitations in the data, notably, that they are self-reported by donor nations to the Afghan government. Furthermore, the data for larger donors are considered more reliable than the data for smaller donors, according to the Department of State. Owing to these limitations and our lack of access to donor nations’ financial records, we were unable to determine the reliability of the dollar amounts reported to have been pledged by each donor. Nevertheless, we present the reported pledges in appendix II for the purpose of broadly comparing the U.S. contributions with those of other major donors.

To examine the results of assistance projects through September 30, 2004, we focused our efforts on the major USAID reconstruction contracts signed prior to the start of fiscal year 2004. The contracts account for approximately 85 percent of the U.S.’ reconstruction expenditures for the fiscal year. We collected and analyzed information from the Departments of State and Defense, and USAID in Washington, D.C., outlining policy goals, basic strategies, program objectives, and monitoring efforts. We reviewed the periodic progress reports provided by both USAID and its implementing partners for all the major reconstruction projects. To assess the reliability of these reports, we contacted each of USAID’s cognizant technical officers in Kabul about the reliability of the information provided in the implementing partners’ reports. While they noted that security restrictions and the large territory in Afghanistan make monitoring difficult, all of the cognizant technical officers we contacted consider the data to be generally reliable for the purposes of providing an overall status of the projects. In October 2004, we traveled to Afghanistan to examine the implementation of USAID and Defense’s assistance-related operations. While in Afghanistan, we spent 12 days in the capital city, Kabul, interviewing officials from the Afghan Ministries of Finance, Health, and Agriculture; the Central Bank; the U.S. Departments of State and Defense; and USAID. We also met with most of USAID’s primary implementing partners (including the International Organization for Migration, the Louis Berger Group, Inc., Creative Associates International Inc., Chemonics, Bearing Point, the International Republican Institute, the International Foundation for Election Systems, Management Sciences for Health, Management Systems International, Population Services International, Technologists Incorporated, and the Asia Foundation). In addition, we met with the officials from the British Embassy in Kabul responsible for counternarcotics initiatives. In Kabul, we inspected the rehabilitation of the Rabia Balkhi Women’s hospital. We also spent 8 days in the Ghazni, Hirat, Kunduz, and Nangahar provinces, where we reviewed U.S.- funded projects, implemented primarily by USAID’s Office of Transition Initiatives, USAID’s PRT-based staff, or Defense’s PRTs. While in these provinces, we met with provincial governors, district leaders, teachers, healthcare workers, and other community members involved in, or affected by, U.S. reconstruction projects. Constraints placed on our movement within Afghanistan by the U.S. Embassy due to security concerns limited the number of project sites we could visit.

To analyze the assistance coordination mechanisms developed by the U.S. government and the international community we met with State Department of State staff responsible for assistance coordination. We also met with and staff from USAID, and the Departments of Agriculture, Commerce, Defense, U.S. Trade and Development Agency, and Treasury who were involved in the provision of assistance, to obtain their views on the coordination of assistance. In addition, we reviewed the U.S. National Security Strategy; the State-USAID consolidated strategic plan for fiscal years 2004-2009; the President’s Security Strategy for Afghanistan; the U.S. Embassy–Kabul Mission Program Plan; and USAID’s strategy and action plan for Afghanistan. Our analysis of international coordination mechanisms included a review of United Nations (UN) and Afghan government documents, including the Afghan National Development Framework and Budget, pertaining to the international coordination mechanisms utilized in Afghanistan in fiscal year 2004. In addition, we met with officials from the Afghan Ministries of Agriculture, Finance, and Health, and from the Central Bank to obtain their views on the evolution and status of the consultative group mechanism.

To analyze the obstacles that affected the implementation of U.S. reconstruction assistance we reviewed reports produced by the Departments of State and Defense, USAID, the UN, the International Crisis Group, and the Afghanistan Research and Evaluation Unit. To assess the reliability of the UN data on opium production we reviewed the methodology used by the UN to estimate levels of opium poppy cultivation and opium production. We determine that the UN data is sufficiently reliable for the purpose of this report. Finally, we discussed the obstacles and their impact with officials from the Afghan ministries of Agriculture, Finance, and Health; the Afghan Central Bank; the Afghan Counternarcotics Directorate; USAID; and the Department of State.

We conducted our review from August 2004 to May 2005 in accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards.

Sector Level Performance Indicators

The Accelerating Success initiative performance measures reported to the Afghanistan Interagency Operations Group in Fiscal 2004 were initially developed by USAID during a 3-day period in June 2003. The measures were modified during that fiscal year with input from other agencies and represent a subset of the measures reported for each of the major reconstruction contracts. The development of performance measures for each major contract varied. In some sectors, such as agriculture, performance measures were included in the contract. In other sectors, such as health, the measures were developed in a performance management plan developed by the contractor after the contract was awarded or, as in the economic sector, developed late in the project and published in periodic progress reports. The tables below describe the Accelerating Success performance measures reported by the Afghanistan Interagency Operations Group and the more detailed measures developed by individual contractors for the major reconstruction contracts.

The RAMP contract contains 14 performance measures (see table 6), including program outputs such as the implementation of 615 irrigation projects and project outcomes such as increasing the average productivity of approximately 500,000 farm families by more than 100 percent. However, the contractor did not have systems in place to capture information for all measures.

Of three primary awards for democracy and governance activities, USAID required only one implementing partner MSI, to develop a performance monitoring plan containing performance measures (see table 8). The other two partners, The Consortium for Elections and Political Process Strengthening and the Asia Foundation, were required to produce quarterly reports but were not required to develop specific targets or intermediate results. Consequently, the quarterly reports described activities undertaken during that time period, rather than progress achieved against specified targets.

The economic governance contract did not specifically require the contractor to develop performance measures. Instead, it required the reporting of “milestones” in quarterly work plans. No quarterly plans were produced until July 2004; consequently, no measures were reported until that time. (See table 10.)

USAID required the health contractor, Management Sciences for Health (MSH), to develop implementation plans and performance monitoring plans. MSH reports on selected performance indicators in these plans semiannually. (See Table 14)

The reported measures also provide detailed narrative about progress on primary and secondary road projects and ongoing power-generation projects. Irrigation projects are tracked as part of the agriculture sector, and school and clinic construction and renovation are tracked as parts of the education and health sectors, respectively. The measures do not track water and sanitation projects. See table 16 below.

The Afghanistan Freedom Support Act of 2002 and the 2004 Emergency Supplemental legislated assistance to Afghan women. USAID implemented and tracked most of these objectives either as part of their other sector programs or through individual women-targeted projects (see table 17.) However, no gender-specific performance measures of sector programs nor the results of individual women-targeted projects were reported to the Afghanistan Interagency Operations Group.

Comments from the U.S. Agency for International Development

GAO Contacts and Staff Acknowledgements

GAO Contacts

Staff Acknowledgments

John Hutton, David Bruno, Miriam A. Carroll, and Christina Werth made key contributions to this report. In addition, Martin de Alteriis, Mark Dowling, Etana Finkler, Reid Lowe and Adam Vodraska provided technical assistance.