GNV News, 30 October 2026

On 29 October, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) released survey findings indicating that opium production in Afghanistan has increased by about fivefold in the space of one year. The area under cultivation of opium poppies, the raw material for opium, expanded from about 10,000 hectares in 2025 to more than 43,000 hectares, a 330% increase. The estimated production volume of opium also rose from about 300 tons to nearly 1,500 tons. This is the first major increase since the Taliban’s interim government banned poppy cultivation in 2022.

According to UNODC, farmers are cultivating poppies in ways that avoid detection by the authorities. They hide small plots within grain fields, grow poppies inside walled compounds, and stagger planting and harvesting times. The interim government claims it eradicated 22,000 hectares in 2026, but the Interior Ministry rejects the UN data and insists that cultivation has fallen to nearly zero.

Cultivation has spread to 16 of the country’s 34 provinces (five more than the previous year), and about three-quarters is concentrated in the northeast. The farm-gate price of opium has fallen from US$570 per kilogram to US$500, but it remains far above the US$100 or less that prevailed before the ban. The report also notes that regional price gaps could encourage smuggling from the northeast to the southwest.

In the background is the fact that while the ban reduced cultivation by about 96%, farmers’ incomes have remained lost. In a UNODC survey at the end of 2025, about 85% of households in the north said they had not been able to replace their poppy income, or had only partially done so. At the same time, there is an estimate that around 12,000 tons of opium were in storage in the country as of 2025, and some analysts argue that it is a separate question whether the ban has actually reduced overall drug trafficking.

The 2026 World Drug Report points out signs that the supply of heroin derived from opium poppies is beginning to decline in Europe, noting this trend. If demand remains unchanged and prices stay high while supply falls, cultivation could increase even further. UNODC Executive Director Monica Juma stressed that as long as there are poor farmers with no alternative sources of income, it will be difficult to keep reducing cultivation. She added that, in addition to livelihood support, developing agricultural infrastructure and improving access to markets, there is a need to investigate and dismantle cross-border trafficking networks. UNODC says it will use future surveys to determine whether this sharp increase is temporary or the start of a renewed expansion.

Learn more about Afghanistan → “Afghanistan: Deepening Humanitarian Crisis”

Learn more about impacts on neighboring areas → “The Escalating Drug Crisis in Balochistan, Pakistan”