The association of the quality of life with Afghan households’ food insecurity before and after the recent political change in Afghanistan: a comparative analysis
Jumakhan Saif-Nijat, Mohammad Reza Pakravan-Charvadeh, Saeed Gholamrezai, Mehdi Rahimian, Ginny Lane, Daniel Béland, Mustafa Koç, Nancy Clark, Nasrin Omidvar, Rasoul Sadeghi, Hassan Vatanparast
Abstract
The overreaching objective of the current study is to investigate the association of quality of life with Afghan households' food insecurity. The data was collected immediately after the Taliban took control of a large part of Afghanistan. About a total of 555 households' heads participated in a face-to-face interview, using the HFIAS and WHOQOL-100 questionnaires along with some questions related to their socioeconomic characteristics at two different times, before and after the Taliban's takeover. The comparative analysis showed that 98% of Afghan households were food insecure after the Taliban takeover, while 70% of them faced food insecurity before the Taliban's takeover. The quality of life in the Taliban era is worse than before the Taliban. All dimensions of quality of life have decreased, and this decrease was more pronounced for the psychological, environmental, and physical domains. It is recommended that international organizations, NGOs, and local agents focus on these dimensions of the quality of life to improve food security.