Welfare impacts of Afghan trade on Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provinces of Pakistan
Saad Shabbir *
The unity deal between the two runner ups of the May 2014 Afghan presidential election and successive announcement of the Bilateral Security Agreement (BSA) on 30 September 2014 is likely to be only a transient panacea for all. The recovery of Afghanistan’s economic institutions and transition of power, however, is still a long way from here. However, this major turning point in the history of Afghanistan will be crucial in defining its future, the trickle down effects of which will determine the stability of the Pak-Afghan region. Concerns about what the future holds for this region given its long history of violence and insurgency are growing eloquent.

Unlike most studies conducted on Afghan-Pak region that focus on the security dimension, this study explores the welfare and economic impacts of a post-2014 Afghanistan on Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in Pakistan. Using secondary sources, the first aim of this study is to estimate the increase in number of households associated with Trade, Transport, Warehousing and Communication (TTWC) sectors during 2004-2011. Secondly, it will try to determine how many of these households in TTWC sectors belong to the lowest income quintiles defined in the Household Income and Expenditure Survey of Pakistan. And finally, it will compare the growth in incomes of TTWC sectors vis-à-vis non-trade sectors of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan provinces in Pakistan.


* Parts of this abstract have been published in Shabir, S. 2014, ‘Economic impacts of post-2014 Afghanistan’, Economic Affairs, 12 July,
<http://economicaffairs.com.pk/economic-impacts-of-post-2014-afghanistan/>, accessed 2 October 2014.
* Mr. Saad Shabbir is a senior researcher at Sustainable Development Policy Institute (SDPI), Islamabad, Pakistan. His current areas of interest are trade and economic growth. He has also worked on forecasting and market crisis in Pakistan.