Afghan villagers turn to gold-panning to sustain livelihoods

In the rugged Hindu Kush mountains of eastbound Afghanistan, hundreds of men scour the rocky Kunar riverbed for precious golden dust, creating a livelihood amid constricted economical options.

Against the backdrop of towering peaks, immoderate inactive snow-capped successful April, workers labour adjacent the Pakistan border, seeking invaluable flecks that could alteration their fortunes successful a state plagued by debased wages.

Near Kharwalu colony successful Kunar state – with its mud-brick homes and terraced wheat fields – men excavate adust sections of the riverbed earlier washing their rocky hauls with stream water.

Delawar, 45, joined these golden prospectors aft leaving his operation occupation 7 hours from his Kabul home.

“There are not galore occupation opportunities successful the country, and successful this way, we person created enactment for ourselves,” said the begetter of 8 who uses lone 1 name.

“The golden nuggets we find are usually smaller than a atom of wheat,” helium added.

In adjacent Ghaziabad, hundreds spot distant astatine the mountainside with picks, carrying dense sacks down steep slopes to bare onto sieves for golden filtration.

Others usage yellowish jerrycans attached to agelong woody handles to determination stream h2o implicit sieves, allowing smaller, perchance gold-bearing stones to descent onto mats. After 2 further siftings, golden nuggets occasionally look successful metallic pans.

Gul Ahmad Jan, 35, claims the enactment tin beryllium lucrative.

“We tin get up to astir 1gm of gold,” worthy astir 8,000 Afghani ($125) successful conscionable 1 week, helium said.

Afghanistan’s earthy resources remained mostly unexploited during decades of conflict, though a Kunar authoritative told the AFP quality bureau that golden panning has occurred determination for much than 10 years.