Afghanistan’s economy still relies heavily on opium, cannabis | DW News

Amid the economic malaise in Afghanistan, there’s one market raking in cash – the opium trade. The UN has reported a record opium harvest in the country for the fifth year running – worth up to 2.7 billion dollars annually. Over 100,000 Afghans are involved in the illegal trade. For many farmers, opium is the only way to make ends meet. DW correspondent Nick Connolly met some of them. After years of earning protection money from the illegal drug trade, while fighting their insurgency against Afghanistan’s Western-backed government, the Taliban now say they want to put an end to the cultivation and use of what is – by most estimates – the country’s most valuable export. This at a time of extreme stress for the country’s farmers. Drought, plummeting consumer demand and border closures have seen their incomes dwindle. The one crop still performing for these farmers is the opium poppy. Here in Kandahar province it’s sold openly alongside the farmers’ other produce. The only thing the Taliban announce