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January 19, 2006
Stuck in a time warp
By S. Mudassir Ali Shah
Afghan women associated with the carpet industry suffer from many illnesses. Some take refuge in drugs and give opium to their babies to keep them quiet, so they can work uninterrupted, reports S. Mudassir Ali Shah
Ignorant of their rights and stuck in a virtual time warp, carpet-weaving women in northern Afghanistan are suffering from various ailments including drug addiction, as a corollary of working in an exploitative environment. The more the industry flourishes, the deeper they sink in the vortex of exploitation at the hands of industrialists who are completely free of government control.
A senior official of the Rabia Balkhi Advocacy and Skill Building Agency (RASA) paints an extremely sorry picture of the working conditions in Afghanistan’s leading industry. Nilofar Sayar, who recently released a 65-page report based on the three months of investigations by a RASA team, voices grave concern at the continued plight of the women and girls employed in carpet-weaving centres in Balkh, Jawzjan, Kunduz, Khost, Herat and other provinces.
The RASA head for northern provinces says that the underpaid women — due to their sedentary jobs — suffer from many illnesses such as rhematism, joint pains, infertility, depression, stomach disorders, hair loss and gynaecological complications. Despite all their hard work they do not earn enough to afford badly-needed medications.
Most of them hide the fact that they take opium, largely because of the social stigma attached to addiction among women — but their pale looks and speech defects tell a different story.
Some of them, however, are up-front about using the drugs themselves and administering it to their babies for the sake of greater efficiency at work. “I have been giving small doses of opium to my daughter to calm her,” admits Safar Gul, who hails from the Choghdak district. “If a carpet-weaving girl wants to ward off exhaustion, she will have to take a bit of it and opiate her children to keep them quiet,” she maintains, reasoning, “If I quit the job, we will go hungry.”
Doctors in Mazar-i-Sharif confirm the high prevalence of waist and joint pains, waning sight and respiratory ailments among carpet-weavers subjected to perpetual grind and distress. Most of these maladies, medical research suggests, are linked to continual contact with wool and excessive use of unhygienic milk, cheese and yoghurt. Teenaged girls working for long hours in these enclosed, wet and dark places in particular, run the risk of rhematism and anemia.
Because of such harsh conditions, says Dr Syed Mahram Ghayas, the girls fall victims to acute iron, calcium, and vitamin deficiency. With time, they become anaemic and soon start experiencing joint pains. Drained of these vital food components, pregnant women are more vulnerable to developing tuberculosis. The doctor underlined special pre- and post-natal care for them.
Pediatrician Zabiullah Salehi points out that carpet-weavers and tailors, little realizing the consequences of the opium they have long been meting out to their children, are to blame for their children’s dependence on drugs at a later stage. Opium addiction at a tender age is bound to damage the baby’s stomach, he said, adding prolonged use of perilous combinations like poppy-shells, their seeds and sap, could even lead to death.
About 300 women carpet-weavers — 113 of them learning the art at the age of nine, 151 at 11 and the rest at 15 — were interviewed by RASA reporters and their views incorporated in the incisive report compiled in the form of a booklet.
Given the enormity of their workload including various domestic chores, the carpet-weavers tend to seek refuge in taking opium to fight fatigue .
Nilofar Sayar urges the government to ban the hand-woven carpet industry if it cannot ensure a fair deal for the tens of thousands of ill-treated people associated with the carpet industry that earns the impoverished landlocked country a good deal of foreign exchange.
According to the report, the women working day and night are paid a small part of the income generated by the artistically-made rugs. The majority share of the earnings land in pockets of carpet traders, points out the report. Dr Ghayas says that the government should establish health clinics for the workers and schools for their children besides restructuring the industry on modern lines as to make the industry more cost effective.
She demanded that international banks and aid organizations extend the carpet-weavers small loans in order to enable the long-exploited individuals to set up their own businesses and thus get out of the vicious circle that they were caught up in.
Scores of carpet-weavers interviewed by the RASA team, say that they are treated like money-minting machines by their families and unethical industrialists. With no option, these women have little say in rationalizing the difficult schedules dictated by their employers and family patriarchs, who force them them to work well into the night. Quite a few girls are reported to have gone through the trauma of giving stillbirths while working on the looms.
As Afghan carpet prices are increasing globally, it is high time that the Afghan government, eyeing accession to the WTO, regulate the industry.
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