Faces of Philanthropy - An Interview with Polly McTaggart

What is Global Partnership for Afghanistan and when was it started?

GPFA was started in late 2003 by an American lawyer, Dana Freyer, who heads up Arbitrations for Skadden Arps and an Afghan American, Ishaq Nadiri, who is Professor of Economics at NYU and former Economics Minister to Hamid Karzai. They saw countless desperately poor Afghans returning to their scorched land with no means of a livelihood. They met with local suras (town councils) to ask how to help and were told "help us return to our lives as farmers, growing orchards of apples, apricots, almonds and grapes". Afghanistan's proud legacy was once the "Garden of Central Asia". And so GPFA was born.

In March 2004, the first 60 farmers planted 2000 fruit tree saplings and poplar cuttings in Guldara. Since that time five years ago, GPFA and its farmers have planted nearly 5 million trees in 10 provinces. We are now involved in educating farmers in business skills, farm management, creating scholarships for agriculture students and have a robust women's program in beekeeping, tree farming and vegetable gardening.

How did you get involved?

I got involved in 2005 after searching for a way to help Afghans when America turned away from them to fight the war in Iraq. The Afghans had paid a huge price in lives to repel the Soviets in the late 1980's which subsequently led to the breakup of the Soviet Union, from which we reaped incalculable benefits. When I saw an article about 5 small organizations helping the Afghans, one of which was restoring their trees, I called them up and started helping in every way I could.

What is important to me as someone entering the last trimester of life is to choose ways I can make a significant impact on the quality of life of others who were not so blessed. There are endless worthy causes and so much suffering in the world that demands our help. The cause of helping Afghan farmers return to relative prosperity not only provides food and a growing income but it impacts the security of this country. Every Afghan who can succeed in providing a good life for his family is one who has every incentive to repel the terrorist groups such as the Taliban and al Qaida. When I was in Afghanistan 3 weeks ago, many of our Afghans staff were showing up at 6am for English lessons given by another staff member, and farmers were walking long distances to our training sessions at regional offices. It is a privilege to be able to help people with such hope for their future and drive to succeed.

What are your goals for the Project?

GPFA has been so successful because our staff of 120 people is all Afghan except for our ExDirector and two people in New York. Our goals are to continually educate and professionalize our staff so they can train Afghan farmers to become thriving farmers running successful businesses. We provide oversight, tools, grafting, irrigation and other training plus recordkeeping, marketing and and sales training. We are supporting new related businesses, working with universities to develop agriculture programs and demonstration lots and hiring women staff to develp our women's programs significantly.
We are in 10 provinces around Kabul and have had very few security issues. We need to move west towards Herat and eventually south as conditions improve. Afghans are very hard working and are immensely grateful to Americans whom they know are helping them regenerate their livelihoods.

Do you collaborate with other charities?

We collaborate with some other organizations who recognize our reputation of producing highly effective results on the ground, developing excellent relationships with the Afghans and operating with a lean overhead. We have partnered with Cornell University and other organizations such as Roots of Peace, which focuses on clearing land mines and planting grapes.

Please tell us about your upcoming event with Charlie Wilson.

On Dec 4th, Charlie Wilson, the real Charlie, is coming to Greenwich to a wonderful dinner party we are organizing at a private home. He wants to do what he can to help the Afghans and has agreed to speak that evening. If you want more information, call our office at 212-735-2080.