Tropical Wholefoods in Afghanistan
Technical Director Richard Friend's been in Afghanistan working with our partner Parwan Raisin Producer Cooperative (PRPC) helping them to prepare for their first Fairtrade inspection. This week, we have heard that the inspection was successful and that Parwan are now Fairtrade certifed raisin producers. Hurrah! Here are a few of Richard's blogs sent from Afghanistan. 07.40 arrival in Kabul Airport. I fill out the foreigner registration form, recruiting the very bored official to help select two pictures from my collection seems to do the trick, he is slightly amused and doesn't bother me about my tourist visa and uncomplainingly uses my sleep deprived spider scrawl to glean all the information he needs to fill out a card in a similarly illegible scrawl to my own, to which he attaches and stamps my picture. This is very good as failure to gain - albeit a completely illegible - foreigner identification card can lead to i) The need to visit the appropriate ministry for a half day queue / scrum. ii) Hassle if you get stopped without one (theoretically likely as passport checks for foreigners are very common although nobody asks for the card.) iii) The need to pay a fine when trying to leave. Several techy ex-pats don't want to fill in the form "can we get one from somewhere else" "from the ministry". "where is the ministry" "in the city" accompanied with a low energy gesture in the presumed direction of Kabul.
Once outside, my small pleasure of getting a trolley to the side where you can push into the queue for the bag receipt checkers is dissipated as can't find Aman (our man in Kabul). I call Aman wait for 30 minutes in the sun, call again, drink two cans of lemonade before wandering off in the direction of car park C. No need! Here he is sitting down in the shade of the waiting area 30 metres from where I was standing. From here onto a Mercy Corps guest house called Montana Base. I have been here before. It's a three storey shared self-catering accommodation for ex-pat staff members, much less lonely than a hotel which makes it much more comfortable. Sleep.
13.00 Kabul. Time to start work at Mercy Corps office "Kilo base". Preparation for the Raisin Producer Cooperative General Assembly where I am to speak tomorrow. We meet the MC security head to get permission to go to Charicar since there are security restrictions in Kabul due to an international conference. It's ok. Aman is wants to discuss the catering arrangements at length. We agree on cake and Pepsi for the farmers' meeting and lunch in Charicar with the coop board. To pull off the cheaper cake and pepsi option we need to get finished by 12 or meat and rice will be required! Hopefully we can do the board meeting over lunch so we can get back before the international conference stops the traffic. Back to Montana Base via Finest Supermarket. Finest has quite robust anti ram raid / suicide bomb defences and you get frisked on the way in but in other respects it's like a very expensive down market Sainsbury's. Write up my stuff, cook some tea and it's time for bed.