Afghan pomegranate pickers left jobless

Afghan pomegranate pickers left jobless

KANDAHAR: Afghanistan’s festive pomegranate season has begun, but this year thousands of tons of the juicy red fruit risk rotting on trucks blocked at Pakistan’s frequently shuttered border-leaving thousands of farm workers unemployed. With its tart and crunchy, ruby-red seeds locked inside a leathery red rind, the pomegranate is renowned for its health benefits, and is one of the most important crops in the country’s south.

But the fruit is ripening as Afghanistan finds itself engulfed in a multitude of crises that have metastasized since the Taleban seized control two months ago. “We have 15,000 farm workers in this region who have been laid off because the trade has been paralyzed and the fruit is rotting,” Haji Nani Agha, who heads the Fresh Fruits Union in Kandahar, said. In the shade of pomegranate shrubs, the melon-sized fruits fill burlap bags and crates being loaded onto trucks soon to head towards the Spin Boldak border with Pakistan.

But there their voyage comes to a halt. Islamabad has cut sales tax on imported fruits to zero in a bid to boost trade from its neighbor, but also tightened controls on ordinary Afghans trying to cross over, fearing illegal entries. It has caused a tug-of-war