An investment of more than $2 billion US in irrigation, roads and other rural development is needed to wean Afghanistan off booming opium cultivation, a development bank report said Tuesday.

Afghan police are seen destroying opium poppies in April 2007.
(Rafiq Maqbool/Associated Press)

The report, by the World Bank and Britain-based Department for International Development, argued that opium cultivation — Afghanistan's leading business — can only be combated if the country's impoverished farmers have other means of making a living.

"Without strong economic and development underpinnings, other counter-narcotics efforts cannot achieve sustained success," said the 98-page report.

Needed steps include boosting community-based development projects, expanding irrigation, increasing use of livestock, and helping rural businesses and entrepreneurs thrive.

The proposals include investments of $1.2 billion US to expand the land under irrigation, $550 million to boost rural enterprise development, and $400 million for rural road planning, construction and maintenance.

The money would be spent over a period up to 10 years.

Afghan Foreign Minister Dadfar Spanta on Monday met with Japanese officials to gain support for his country's reconstruction.

Spanta, along with a group of other ministers from Afghanistan, is in Tokyo to attend an annual international conference on the war-torn country's reconstruction, held Tuesday and Wednesday.

The 24-member Joint Co-ordinating and Monitoring Board was established to monitor implementation of the Afghanistan Compact, adopted at a London conference in January 2006.

It is a five-year blueprint between the international community and the Afghan government to promote security, good governance, the rule of law, human rights and economic and social development in Afghanistan as well as fight the drug trade.

The Tokyo meeting is the third meeting to review the progress of projects over the past year and discuss future support for Afghanistan, Japan's Foreign Ministry said.