Agriculture accounts for 45% of Afghanistan's gross domestic
product and is the main source of income for the Afghan economy.
Over 80% of the Afghan population is involved in farming, herding,
or both. However, decades of war, drought, and security challenges
have devastated the country's agricultural sector, and the current
level of U.S. government civilian support has been unable to keep
pace with the tremendous need for assistance in this region.
Revitalizing Afghanistan's agricultural sector is critical to
building the government's capacity and to stabilizing the country.
In 2007 the Secretary of the Army, Pete Geren; Director of the Army
National Guard, Lieutenant General Clyde Vaughn; Missouri Farm
Bureau President, Charles Kruse; and the Adjutant General of the
Missouri National Guard, Major General King Sidwell developed an
idea to deploy Soldiers with agricultural expertise and organic
security capabilities to Afghanistan. They realized the development
of Afghanistan's agriculture and agricultural products distribution
capabilities was vital to long-term economic development and that
governmental civilians (United States, Afghanistan, and other
countries) and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) were not
resourced for the massive amount of work necessary in these areas
as well as for the security they required. Collectively, these
leaders saw the farming expertise contained within the National
Guard to be the solution farming skills to grow the Afghan
agribusiness economy and Soldier skills vital to operating in a
counterinsurgency environment. The 935th ADT, Missouri Army
National Guard (MOARNG), had the distinct honor of being the first
military ADT created and deployed by the United States. The 935th
ADT was comprised of Soldiers from 16 different MOARNG units. The
Soldiers who volunteered for this mission not only possessed a
broad spectrum of military occupational skills but also were
selected based upon their civilian-acquired farming skills and
agribusiness knowledge. The ADT partnered with the U.S. Department
of Agriculture, the U.S. Agency for International Development, the
Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, the affected Afghan provincial
government, various Afghan colleges and universities, and other
governmental and NGOs to maximize the use of resources, affect
efficient coordination, and avoid conflict with other projects. The
success of the 935th ADT was through identifying the farming
deficiencies in its area of operations, obtaining funding and other
resources, training and updating the agribusiness skills of the
Afghan farmers and educators, and showing how to do these actions
through hands-on training. The ADT's efforts included repair and
maintenance of farm equipment; veterinarians to aid sick animals
and provide techniques to enhance the quality and reproductive
capabilities of livestock; repair and improvement of irrigation
systems destroyed by decades of war; and instruction on various
farming techniques for fertilizing, planting, marketing, storage,
and distribution of crops. Projects and training undertaken by the
ADT must be sustainable with local assets, as the ADT is only in
the province for 10 to 11 months. Ideally, follow-on ADTs will
deploy to back-fill the departing ADTs to continue the agribusiness
training and improvements initiated by the redeploying ADTs.
However, whether it is a follow-on ADT or an ADT deploying to an
area for the first time, the ADTs must deploy with sufficient time
available to affect the next growing season and subsequent harvest.
The future of ADT service in Afghanistan is projected to diminish
as civilian government agencies grow their capabilities to assist
the Afghan agricultural economy reestablish itself. While this will
take several years, ADTs will continue to serve U.S. and Afghan
interests by helping farmers return the fertile Afghan countryside
to the green and productive environment it was prior to the
invasion of Soviet forces almost 40 years ago.
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