IEA leadership approves 5-year development strategy: Mujahid

KABUL (Pajhwok): The Islamic Emirate leadership has approved the Afghanistan Development Strategy formulated to achieve the country’s fundamental goals for the next five years and lead all Emirati institutions in a unified direction, an official said on Tuesday.

Islamic Emirate spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid told a press conference in Kabul that the Afghanistan Development Strategy had been formulated and approved to achieve the country’s major and fundamental goals using internal capacities and resources.

He said the strategy would coordinate available resources and activities of all ministries and agencies to achieve the country’s development goals — good governance, international relations, security and public order, economy and social development.

He said that the strategy has ten sectors (economic and agricultural affairs, natural resources and energy, housing and social cohesion, transport and communications, religious and modern education and cultural affairs, health, social security and environmental protection) and fifteen priority programs.

He added that the strategy included priority programs for ensuring the rule of Sharia law and Islamic social justice, prioritizing good governance and international relations, reforming the public sector, transparency and accountability, strengthening and developing regional and international relations, maintaining security and public order and protecting borders.

He also said that this strategy includes programs for law enforcement, combating crime and strengthening local governance, urban and rural development, priority areas for economic and social development, effective and sustainable use of natural resources and energy security, development of agriculture and livestock sectors, improvement of financial management and development of electronic payments, improvement of health services and food security, development of education, human resources and cultural development, telecommunication and information technology, and development of transport and transit infrastructure.

Mujahid pointed out the importance of the strategy, saying it was aimed to set the country’s development vision for the next five years.

He added the strategy set major goals and priorities to create a single umbrella for managing the country’s development affairs, effectively allocate resources to achieve the system’s basic goals and priorities, unify and coordinate the activities of the Emirati institutions to achieve the country’s major goals and priorities, organize the private sector within the framework of the country’s basic goals, and facilitate and accelerate balanced development at the country level.

He assured the masses the implementation of this long-term document would yield better results and effective steps would be taken gradually to achieve the basic goals.

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