“This assistance helped me with the treatment for my daughter,” says Masouma. We have supported 1,140 families in northern Afghanistan with cash for food assistance
Published: Nov 15, 2023 Reading time: 2 minutes
We drove to Dasht e Shoor, a valley near Mazar-e Sharif, where most of the residents are internally displaced people or returnees, and approximately 90% of them are suffering from poverty and hunger.
We met 44-year-old Masouma. She lives with her three daughters and one son. Before the Taliban retook power in Afghanistan in August 2021, she worked as a cook at Saafi High School for over 13 years. However, she is now unemployed and she has lost her husband as well.
Not only did she lose everything, including her house as she could no longer afford the rent, but her daughter became ill as well.
My younger daughter is suffering from a Hydatid Cyst
“My younger daughter is suffering from a Hydatid Cyst. We brought her to the government hospital, but we could not afford to buy her medication. So I borrowed some cash from my friends and relatives to provide medicine for her. After a month of medication, we did not see any improvement in her health so we were obliged to agree to an operation. Now it’s been two weeks since her surgery,” says Masouma.
While she also works a daily job, her son has had to take on the responsibility of feeding the family. Being the primary breadwinner, he had to abandon the 9th class to become a daily worker.
Six rounds of cash for food assistance
PIN has implemented a project in Mazar-e Sharif to provide cash support to food-insecure families so they can meet their most immediate needs. Masouma and her family were among the people who received financial support from PIN, thanks to funding from the Afghanistan Humanitarian Fund (AHF).
The project targeted IPC 3 and 4 households that could not meet their basic needs due to the lack of finances. The cash distribution has been coupled with nutrition awareness sessions to ensure they can make informed decisions on how to utilise their cash support.
“I received the cash as sistance six times each time 6,200Afs (72$). Because of this money, I was able to purchase medicine for my daughter, milk, rice, oil, sugar, and other food to feed my young children,” says Masouma.
