World Enivironmental Issues Brief

  • LARGE AREAS SUBJECT TO OVERPOPULATION
  • INDUSTRIAL DISASTERS
  • POLLUTION (air, water, acid rain, toxic substances)
  • LOSS OF VEGETATION (overgrazing, deforestation, desertification)
  • LOSS OF WILDLIFE
  • SOIL DEGRADATION
  • SOIL DEPLETION
  • EROSION
  • GLOBAL WARMING

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Global Issues Snapshots

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Afghanistan

— Current Environmental Issues —
limited natural fresh water resources; inadequate supplies of potable water; soil degradation; overgrazing; deforestation (much of the remaining forests are being cut down for fuel and building materials); desertification; air and water pollution

— Health Indicators —
HIV / AIDS prevalancy rate: 0.0
Fertility Rate: 6.6
Infant Mortality Rate: 157.4
Life Expectancy at Birth: Male: 43.6
Life Expectancy at Birth: Female: 44.0
Life Expectancy at Birth: Total Population: 43.8

— Population —
Population Total: 31,889,923
Population Growth Rate: 2.6

— Economic Indicators —
GDP Real Growth Rate: 8.4
Military Expendatures Percent of GDP: 1.9
Unemployment Rate: 40.0
Inflation rate (consumer prices): 16.3
GDP Per Capita PPP: 800
Population Below Poverty Line: 53
    (Definitions of poverty vary considerably among nations.)

— Education and Communications —
Global Issues Snapshots
Global Issues Snapshots
Bordering country: China
Bordering country: Iran
Bordering country: Pakistan
Bordering country: Tajikistan
Bordering country: Turkmenistan
Bordering country: Uzbekistan

— Background —
Ahmad Shah DURRANI unified the Pashtun tribes and founded Afghanistan in 1747. The country served as a buffer between the British and Russian empires until it won independence from notional British control in 1919. A brief experiment in democracy ended in a 1973 coup and a 1978 Communist counter-coup. The Soviet Union invaded in 1979 to support the tottering Afghan Communist regime, touching off a long and destructive war. The USSR withdrew in 1989 under relentless pressure by internationally supported anti-Communist mujahedin rebels. Subsequently, a series of civil wars saw Kabul finally fall in 1996 to the Taliban, a hardline Pakistani-sponsored movement that emerged in 1994 to end the countrys civil war and anarchy. Following the 11 September 2001 terrorist attacks in New York City, a US, Allied, and anti-Taliban Northern Alliance military action toppled the Taliban for sheltering Osama BIN LADIN. The UN-sponsored Bonn Conference in 2001 established a process for political reconstruction that included the adoption of a new constitution and a presidential election in 2004, and National Assembly elections in 2005. On 7 December 2004, Hamid KARZAI became the first democratically elected president of Afghanistan. The National Assembly was inaugurated on 19 December 2005.