Iowa ADT irrigates thousands of acres in Afghanistan

Capt. Peter Shinn
Combined Joint Task Force 101

U.S. Air Force Staff Sgt. Bennett Groth, a production agriculture specialist for the Iowa National Guard's 734th Agribusiness Development Team, and U.S. Army Master Sgt. Steve Holding the ADT's pay agent, review payment paperwork Dec. 6 with Noor Rahimi who supervised a cash-for-work project that cleaned out several kilometers of an irrigation canal in the Sarkani District over a two-week period in November. (U.S. Army photo by Capt. Peter Shinn)
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SARKANI, Afghanistan (12/10/10) - A modest cash-for-work project, underwritten by the Iowa National Guard’s 734th Agribusiness Development Team, will allow irrigation of a thousand acres of land and benefit six district villages.

The project, which was to clean out a clogged canal in the Sarkani District of Afghanistan’s Kunar province, cost just more than 155,000 afghani (approximately $3,100), employed 25 Afghan men, plus two supervisors for two weeks.

Each worker earned 5,000 afgani for his labor (just more than $100).

Noor Rahimi, who supervised the project for the ADT, said it was a success.

“This project was very, very good,” Rahimi said. “Now that the canal is cleared, we can irrigate 2,000 jeribs [about a thousand acres], and we had good work for the people. The farmers are very happy, the workers are very happy and I’m very happy.”

He said, in the past, Afghan communities would gather together and clean their own canals.

However, since anti-Afghan forces offered money to young men to take up arms against the Government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, it had become more difficult to get workers to clean canals for free.

Cash-for-work programs, like the one the ADT underwrote, made it less likely workers would join insurgents for money, Rahimi said. The farmland irrigated as a result of the project would be much more productive, boosting income for farmers in the district.

U.S. Air Force Staff Sgt. Bennett Groth, the ADT’s assistant project leader for the Sarkani leader, provided quality control and quality assurance for the canal-cleaning effort.

Groth was also on hand when the ADT made final payment for the project, and he expressed surprise at the project’s far-reaching effects.

“I knew it would help them irrigate some of their land, but I didn’t really expect, like Noor said, that it could reduce the number of insurgents or anything like that,” Groth said. “That’s a lot of bang for the buck.”

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