Zabul Traders Warn of Lack of Export Market for Dried Fruit
Traders in Afghanistan’s Zabul province say continued difficulties in accessing suitable foreign markets have left them facing heavy financial losses and made the export of dried fruit vulnerable.
One dried-fruit trader in Zabul said that nine containers of his goods were recently returned from China to Bandar Abbas. According to him, the incident cost him heavily and he was forced to pay a fine of $50,000. He added that he borrowed the money and suffered losses at a time when there is no suitable market available for exports to India, Pakistan and Kazakhstan.
These concerns were raised at the same time as the opening of an 18 million afghani trade centre in Zabul. Traders stress that without practical export routes, the establishment of such facilities alone cannot solve the problem of selling and transporting their goods.
Meanwhile, Zabul’s Department of Industry and Commerce under the Taliban administration said that, with support from the economic deputy office of the Taliban prime minister’s office, efforts have begun to expand trade with several regional countries, including Uzbekistan. Hikmatullah Mansur, head of the department, said some Zabul traders had earlier been sent to an international exhibition in Uzbekistan and that this issue had also been shared several times with the economic deputy office.
Last year, about 3,500 metric tonnes of figs, almonds, dried apricots and raisins worth nearly $15 million were exported from Zabul. Zabul is considered one of Afghanistan’s agricultural provinces, and dried fruit is among its key export items. However, delegations from Turkey and China that visited the province this year asked farmers not to use chemicals in processing dried fruit, saying only naturally dried products are purchased.
