When the United States and Israel began their military assaults on Iran, it had already been two days since Pakistan declared “open war” on Afghanistan. Only hours before bombs started falling on Tehran, Iran had been offering to serve as a mediator in the escalating flare-up between its two eastern neighbours.
For the next five weeks, Pakistan continued its attacks on urban centres like Kabul, Kandahar, and Asadabad, including a strike on a drug rehabilitation clinic that killed hundreds of civilians. And yet, as the international media focused on the Iran war and global fears of energy price hikes due to the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, these events went largely unnoticed by the outside world.
The Iran war itself has also dealt an additional blow to an Afghan economy that had been showing some green shoots of recovery. Heavily reliant on food imports along supply chains that have dried up, prices have soared, leading to a growing risk of hunger. Those hikes “place additional pressure on families who are already accumulating debt simply to survive”, a March report from World Vision International warned.
Before the Taliban took back control of the country in 2021, Afghanistan had been heavily reliant of foreign aid, but that funding stream has now collapsed, with President Donald Trump’s US administration specifically excluding Kabul from its international aid spending.
The return of more than 5.2 million Afghans from Iran and Pakistan last year – another situation likely to be exacerbated by the war in Iran – is adding a further strain to an Afghan economy marked by endemic poverty, and a chronic scarcity of jobs.
Thamindri De Silva, the national director for World Vision, said the combination of the war in Iran and the flaring conflict with Pakistan have made an already difficult situation in Afghanistan – where
21.9 million people (45% of people) are in need of humanitarian assistance – much worse; a reality donors seem hesitant to prioritise.
“There’s no interest,” De Silva told The New Humanitarian. “We can’t get major donors to provide funding for the Afghanistan response because the focus now is on Lebanon,” where Israeli strikes have forced one million people to flee.
“Less and less is being earmarked for Afghanistan,” she said, pointing to the fact that the UN’s 2026 humanitarian appeal is still 89% unfunded.
Speaking from Herat, a province that borders Iran, De Silva underlined how Afghanistan had already been dealing with the economic blowback from Pakistani military attacks and the closure since October of vital cross-border trade routes.
Months of building economic pressure
Before the Iran war began on 28 February, Afghanistan was already experiencing double-digit price increases for basic commodities.
“When Pakistan closed its routes, prices immediately shot up by 40%,” said Abdul Hadi, a logistics and procurement manager for private businesses in Herat. Using rice as an example, he said a 10-kilo sack went up from $22 to $39 almost instantly.
This situation was compounded by the global economic downturn that followed the launch of the US-Israeli war on Iran.
Because they only stand to make a one or two percent profit from basic commodities, price hikes have a major impact on local businesses.
Abdur Rahman, a vegetable seller who has operated his cart in Herat for seven years, is feeling the pinch. The 32-year-old said that until recently traders could have relied on the city’s proximity to Iran to make up – at least in part – for the shortages and price increases caused by the Pakistani border closure. Not so anymore, and therefore he and other sellers are having to hike their prices.
“It’s simple business. When you have a lot of products coming in, prices are lower,” Abdur Rahman said.
The economic hit is especially significant in a country like Afghanistan, where imports make up nearly 51% of GDP.
Abdur Rahman pointed to the items on his cart as examples: “Potatoes, tomatoes, and peppers; they all come from Iran,” he said, explaining how each of them had doubled in price over the last 40 days.
Afghanistan’s reliance on its neighbours isn’t limited to basic commodities.
Due to the Islamic Emirate’s recent efforts to boost domestic pharmaceutical production, some medical supplies are available, but healthcare workers in Herat said nearly all their specialised equipment, including diagnostic tools, still has to come from Pakistan and Iran.
“We can get medicine and syringes no problem,” said Mohammad Rafih, who has worked in medical laboratories across Herat for the past 10 years. “We have a lot of specific technical equipment that came from Pakistan and Iran, and now those supplies are running dangerously low.”
Rafih said the shortages have left patients having to go from clinic to clinic to find the right equipment, even for basic tests. He gave the example of a patient who needed a progesterone test who had to go to five clinics before finding one that could do it.
Afghanistan is not alone in suffering price hikes and shortages. Iran, to give just a few examples, has seen a 200% rise in flour costs, while poultry farms have shut down due to lack of electricity and fuel. In Pakistan, meanwhile, the government has had to cut development spending, close schools, and impose rations on fuel consumption.
A new influx of need?
The World Food Programme (WFP) has warned that any increase in returnees from Iran will “layer humanitarian needs onto an already dire crisis” in Afghanistan.
According to the UN, that number was already on an upswing by February. More than 150,000 Afghans have returned this year, 80% of them driven out by force. At least 26,000 have been deported since the war began.
For many returnees, “coming back to Afghanistan would mean poverty, unemployment, hunger and more instability”, WFP said.
Abdul Hadi, the logistics and procurement manager, said everyone in Herat has relatives who have returned from Iran over the last five weeks of conflict.
“So many are returning because work is at a standstill. Almost no one is producing anything anymore,” Abdul Hadi said.
Most Afghans work in construction, factories, and workshops in Tehran and Isfahan, two of the most heavily targeted cities, making staying in Iran – where prices are soaring and production is at a near standstill – almost impossible, he added.
Additionally, with 1.4 million Afghans living in Iran without documentation, the risk of deportation remains high, even during war time. By early March, it was estimated that 1,700 Afghans were returning from Iran each day.
With Afghanistan’s unemployment rate hovering around 13%, day labourers say they are the most impacted by the high level of returns. “Everywhere you turn, there are now four times as many workers and not even half as much work,” said Rashed, a 22-year-old plasterer.
Unlike Kabul, which is seeing a boom in construction projects, work has come to a virtual halt in Herat, according to Rashed and around two dozen day labourers gathered along an intersection in the city. With Iran’s two largest steel plants having been hit by multiple rounds of US-Israeli airstrikes, and general production down due to attacks on major cities, there is very little construction work left in Herat.
“Before, you would get at least one job a day. Now, we just stand out here for hours and have nothing to show for it,” said Rashed.
De Silva, from World Vision Afghanistan, said rising returnee numbers also means a major decrease in remittances, which average around $129 per month. For millions of families facing chronic poverty, especially outside major cities like Herat, these remittances are a vital lifeline for food, healthcare, and education.
All this, De Silva said, is only adding to the challenges facing Afghanistan, if only anyone would notice. “The impact will only grow as time goes on, but whether it’s the UN or others, they don’t seem to take the situation here seriously,” she said.
Edited by Andrew Gully.
Afghanistan Peace Campaign
