Afghanistan’s Ministry of Industry and Commerce says more than 160,000 acres of land have been allocated for industrial parks across the country. Deputy minister Ahmadullah Zahid said around 100,000 acres have already been formally transferred to the ministry and the remaining land is still moving through the transfer process.
Zahid also said roughly 5,000 industrial factories are operating in Afghanistan. Both the land and factory figures are official estimates and do not by themselves show how much of the allocated land is already serviced or in active industrial use.
Land is only one requirement for an industrial zone. Factories also need reliable electricity, water, roads, communications, financing, skilled labour and access to suppliers and customers. A park that has land but lacks utilities can remain underused.
The programme therefore matters most when allocation is followed by serviced plots and operating factories. The number of firms that begin production, jobs created, electricity supplied and goods sold will provide a clearer measure of the programme’s economic effect than land allocation alone.