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Synopsis (short abstract)
Under the Emergency Food Security Project (EFSP), funded by the World Bank, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) has launched a large‑scale seed commercialization initiative in Afghanistan.The new approach responds to challenges including liquidity constraints among farming households, seed price affordability for smallholders and weak, fragmented market linkages between farmers and domestic seed producers. These constraints are often more pronounced for women farmers, who face additional mobility and access barriers to agricultural inputs and services. The programme design explicitly incorporates flexible delivery arrangements to mitigate these barriers.Through a co-payment electronic voucher modality, farmers access certified wheat seed directly from Afghan Private Seed Enterprises (PSEs). In the initial phase, the project covers 50 percent of the seed cost, while farmers contribute the remaining balance, strengthening farmer ownership, stimulating demand, helping commercialize the seed sector, reinforcing domestic seed markets and enabling increased domestic production of wheat at macro level.The initiative is designed to reach 135 000 farming households across more than 20 provinces over three agricultural seasons. The entire process is powered by FAO’s Identification, Delivery and Empowerment Application (IDEA) digital platform, enabling biometric verification, transparent tracking, real-time monitoring and the creation of a comprehensive national record of participating farmers. This, in turn, facilitates future expansion and lays the groundwork for a potential farmers’ registry.This brief presents early findings of Phase I of the implementation.