Development gains in Afghanistan must be made sustainable

Alex Thier, assistant to the administrator and director in the USAID Office of Afghanistan and Pakistan Affairs, writes about the agency's new report, titled "USAID in Afghanistan: Partnership, Progress, Perseverance," in this IMPACTblog post. "Afghanistan's literacy, life expectancy, infant mortality statistics, as well as access to communications, electricity, and paved roads, were dismal" in 2002, but a decade later, "Afghanistan has shown incredible gains in health care, education, and economic growth," Thier writes. The report "outlines these impacts in a transparent and frank accounting of the roughly $12 billion in civilian assistance that USAID has implemented in Afghanistan to date," he notes. "But these gains are fragile," he writes, adding, "We must cement the gains from this incredible investment, and make them sustainable" (4/4).