Poverty and Youth Unemployment in Afghanistan: An Analytical Study

This study is designed to examine the status of poverty and youth unemployment in the context of Afghanistan. The relevance of the present study well from the fact that, that Afghanistan is ranked 182th on the human development index is unacceptable. The study employed the incidence of poverty as a function of unemployment, agricultural, manufacturing, and services contributions to real GDP, population, and inflation rate, in which the growth rate of the variables was modeled. The results of the study revealed that unemployment, agricultural and services contributions to real GDP as well as population, have a positive determining influence on the poverty level in Afghanistan, with only the agricultural sector statistically insignificant. On the other hand, manufacturing sector's contribution to real GDP and inflation rate exhibited a negative relationship with the poverty level in Afghanistan, with only the manufacturing sector appearing significant. The study recommended, among other things, that governments should make holistic efforts at all levels to create jobs and arrest unemployment.