Drought, Water and Rural Youth: Living with a Changing Climate

AYP Committee Brief 2026/04 · Committee on Sustainability

Desk-research brief · Published November 2026
Afghanistan Youth Parliament (AYP) – Think Tank Center

About this brief: a desk-research brief prepared by the AYP Think Tank Center for the Committee on Sustainability. It rests only on published sources and is not a record of any meeting or committee decision. Review: internal desk review, November 2026 · Funding: none · Partners: none · Data: published secondary sources · Corrections: none to date. Not peer-reviewed.

Summary

In rural Afghanistan, climate is not an abstract issue. It decides whether there is snow in the mountains, water in the canal in spring, wheat in the field and work for young people in the village. Recent years brought repeated drought, falling groundwater and destructive floods, sometimes in the same year. The effects fall hardest on rural youth, who depend on farming and herding and who are often the first to leave when the land fails. AYP can contribute by building practical knowledge, collecting careful local information, and helping young people find water-wise skills and livelihoods.

Agriculture provides livelihoods, directly or indirectly, to nearly 80% of Afghans, and about 70% of the population lives in rural areas (FAO, 2021). Water for that agriculture comes mostly from the mountains: about 80% of the country’s water resources depend on snow and glacier melt (REACH, 2025). When winter snow fails, spring irrigation fails with it.

Key facts

Warming is measurable. Mean annual temperature rose by about 1.8°C between 1950 and 2010, according to national and UN environment assessments compiled by REACH. Glacier area shrank by more than 13% between 1990 and 2015 (REACH, 2025).
Drought was widespread in 2025. UNDP reports that drought affected 64% of the country in 2025, and that the share of people with access to adequate drinking water fell from 59% in 2024 to 44% in 2025 (UNDP, 2026).
Dry years repeat. In December 2025, the famine early warning network FEWS NET described the 2025/26 season as a sixth year of abnormal dryness and warned of likely poor rainfed wheat yields (FEWS NET, 2025).
The weather can turn quickly. Rainfall in 2026 was more favourable and harvests were strong, yet about 19.2 million people, 38% of the population, are projected to face high acute food insecurity between November 2026 and April 2027. WFP and FAO also warn that an expected El Niño could bring above-average rain, with greater risk of floods and erosion (WFP, 2026).
Floods are a growing hazard. In 2024, floods affected about 170,000 people and killed 459, according to OCHA figures compiled by REACH (REACH, 2025).
Groundwater is falling. In Kabul, groundwater extraction is estimated at two to six times natural recharge, and water levels fell by about 12 metres between 2005 and 2020 (REACH, 2025). A 2025 Mercy Corps assessment reported larger falls of 25 to 30 metres over the past decade, extraction exceeding recharge by about 44 million cubic metres a year, and nearly half of the city’s bore wells already dry (Mercy Corps, 2025). The figures differ by period and method, but they point the same way.

What it means for rural young people

The first effect is on work. When a harvest fails or herds shrink, there is less paid work in the village: less harvesting, threshing, transport and trade. Between 1997 and 2007, about half of Afghanistan’s livestock were lost, mainly to drought (REACH, 2025, citing the World Bank and ADB). A young herder who loses the family’s animals loses both income and a future.

The second effect is movement. Community leaders consulted by IOM named drought as the main reason for new displacement in 2024 and early 2025, mostly from rural areas to towns and cities (REACH, 2025). Household surveys add nuance: among displaced households in summer 2024, unemployment or poverty was the most common reason given, at 38%, and drought was the main reason for 6% (REACH, 2025). In practice, climate and poverty work together. Drought turns a hard life into an impossible one, and young people leave first.

The third effect falls on young women and girls, who in many rural households carry water and care for animals and children. When wells dry up and the walk to water grows longer, their time for learning or earning shrinks further.

The fourth effect is on health. Unsafe water, heat and food shortages affect young people’s health and capacity to work. UNDP’s figure on drinking water, a fall from 59% to 44% in one year, is one of the starkest numbers in recent reporting (UNDP, 2026).

Practical options for AYP and partners

Teach water-wise skills. Short, practical courses on water saving, simple irrigation scheduling, rainwater harvesting, maintaining traditional karez systems and protecting springs can be prepared in Farsi-e-Dari and Pashto, with local examples. AYP’s Chamber of Engineering, Architecture and Environment is the natural home for this content.
Turn climate data into plain language. Seasonal outlooks from FEWS NET, FAO and WFP are public but technical. AYP can produce short, monthly summaries for rural youth: what the season looks like, what risks are expected and where to find help, always citing the original source.
Collect careful local observations. Volunteers can record simple, non-personal observations, such as whether a spring or well has dried, or whether a flood has damaged a canal, to help AYP understand local conditions. This must follow the do-no-harm and privacy rules of the Research Standards and must never put volunteers at risk.
Link climate to livelihoods. Skills that remain useful in dry years, such as repair of pumps and equipment, food processing and storage, small solar systems and veterinary basics, can help young people stay in their communities by choice rather than leave by necessity.
Prepare for floods as well as drought. Simple community guidance on early warning, safe routes and protecting documents and seed stocks can save lives and assets. AYP can share existing official guidance rather than invent its own.
For donors and technical partners: support multi-year water projects that combine infrastructure with local skills, involve young people in maintenance roles, and measure groundwater use, not only new supply.

Next steps and questions for discussion

Which districts lose the most young people to drought-related migration, and what kept others in place? Published IOM displacement data and REACH assessments are the starting point.
Which traditional water practices, such as karez maintenance and shared irrigation schedules, are still working, and what would help young people learn them from older farmers?
What skills do rural employers, cooperatives and repair shops say they cannot find? A short demand-mapping exercise, as proposed in Committee Brief 2026/01, could answer this.
How can climate information reach young people with limited literacy? Short audio summaries in Farsi-e-Dari and Pashto may work better than written bulletins; AYP can test both.
How can women and girls benefit from water projects that reduce the time spent fetching water, and how can that benefit be measured?

AYP will treat these as open questions. Its Chamber of Engineering, Architecture and Environment can invite engineers, hydrologists and agronomists, inside the country and abroad, to review any course or guidance before it is published.

Limitations

Climate and water data for Afghanistan are incomplete and come from different methods and periods; several figures here are compiled by REACH from earlier studies. Groundwater estimates for Kabul vary widely between sources. This brief does not assess specific infrastructure projects.

References

FAO (2021). Afghanistan: FAO urges G20 countries to increase support for rural farmers. FAO Newsroom, 22 September 2021. fao.org
FEWS NET (2025). Afghanistan Agroclimate Monitoring Report, 2025/2026 Season, December 2025 (via ReliefWeb). reliefweb.int
Mercy Corps (2025). Assessment of Kabul’s groundwater crisis, April 2025, as reported by Al Jazeera, 5 July 2025. aljazeera.com
REACH (2025). Afghanistan Climate Change Overview, September 2025. IMPACT Initiatives (compiling NEPA and UN Environment 2016, OCHA, IOM, World Bank and ADB data). repository.impact-initiatives.org
UNDP (2026). Afghanistan Socioeconomic Review, released 13 May 2026; summarised in UN News. news.un.org
WFP (2026). Food insecurity and child malnutrition worsen in Afghanistan despite strong agricultural season (FAO/WFP IPC analysis). News release, October 2026. wfp.org

Afghanistan Youth Parliament (AYP) – Think Tank Center
AYP Committee Brief 2026/04 – November 2026
Corrections and comments: [email protected]