This report examines the impacts that climate change has had on surface water across the Helmand River Basin, as well as the successive efforts of Afghan and Iranian governments to divert water flows in their favour, including through major infrastructural works, such as dams and canals. Drawing on substantial empirical data from fieldwork and satellite imagery, this research suggests that debates over the ongoing and deteriorating dispute between Kabul and Tehran over transboundary water rights is a distraction from what is likely to be a far more significant crisis: the dramatic increase in the exploitation of groundwater across south-west Afghanistan since 2019, reports of substantial yearly drops in the water table, and the livelihoods of as many as 3.65 million people at risk. This pending crisis can be directly attributed to the effects of climate change.
Digging an ever-deeper hole is one of two reports examining tensions arising from the decreasing supplies of water in the Helmand River Basin and state and local community responses. Missing the target: Examining the causes of the conflict on the Afghanistan-Iran border in May 2023 should be read alongside this report.