'', The Canadian Press, 14 October 2009

EXCERPT: "In Afghanistan's war-scarred agrarian society, where farmers tend the land the same way generations of their predecessors did, change happens slowly - especially when it comes to the grassroots civilian effort to replace insurgents with resurgence. The goal is to restore the 'golden age' of farming that existed before the Russians invaded in 1979, with the help of more modern tools like irrigation and fertilizer, as well as lucrative, practical crops like wheat to replace the burgeoning poppy trade. When the Canadian government offered 50-kilogram bags of high-quality Canadian wheat to about 6,000 Afghan farmers last year, only the most adventurous were willing to give it a try. For them, that pioneering spirit is beginning to pay off. Advocates of growing wheat say they can earn as much as they would with poppies, with the added bonus of not having to worry about Taliban reprisals or the threat of having their crops destroyed by poppy eradication teams. 'The price of wheat and poppy are almost balancing each other, and if you cultivate poppy or instead cultivate wheat here, both give you the same money,' farmer Haji Sultan said in an interview."

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See also:
'Quick impact projects slow progress in Afghanistan', The Boston Globe, 15 October 2009
'', Financial Times, 14 October 2009
'Tribal ties, Soviet legacy frustrate Afghan development', DAWN, 9 October 2009
'Poppy planting season poses test for US opium policy', CBS News, 24 September 2009

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