Afghanistan’s opium harvest has surged roughly fivefold in a year as farmers find ways around the Taliban’s ban on poppy growing, according to a new United Nations survey. The findings, released in Kabul on Thursday 29 October, mark the first significant rise since the ban was introduced in 2022 and could have knock-on effects for the heroin trade that reaches Europe.
The Taliban-run interior ministry has flatly rejected the figures, saying cultivation has been cut to almost nothing.
The numbers
The UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) estimates that the area planted with opium poppy rose by about 330 per cent this year, to more than 43,000 hectares, up from around 10,000 hectares in 2025. Estimated opium production jumped by around 400 per cent, from roughly 300 tonnes to just under 1,500 tonnes.
That is still far below where Afghanistan was before the ban. In the year before the Taliban outlawed cultivation in April 2022, poppy covered about 232,000 hectares, and the country once supplied around 80 per cent of the world’s illicit opium.
Prices tell their own story. A kilo of opium fell from $570 to $500 over the year, UNODC said, but that is still more than five times the pre-ban level of under $100, giving farmers a strong incentive to take the risk.
Hidden fields and a shift north
The geography of the trade is changing. Before the ban, most poppy was grown in the south-west, the heartland of provinces such as Helmand. Now about three in every four hectares are in the north-east, which has become the main growing region. Poppy was found in 16 of Afghanistan’s 34 provinces, five more than last year.
UNODC says many farmers appear to have adapted to dodge enforcement, hiding poppy plots among cereal crops or behind compound walls, and staggering planting and harvesting so that fields are harder to spot and destroy. Large price differences between regions could also encourage smuggling from the north-east to the south-west, the agency warned.
Climate pressures are playing a part too. According to an AFP report summarised by the newsletter Foreign Exchanges, one farmer pointed to water shortages linked to climate change, noting that poppy tolerates drought better than many alternative crops.
Taliban hit back
The Afghan interior ministry’s spokesman, Mufti Abdul Mateen Qani, rejected UNODC’s conclusions, Afghan news agency Pajhwok reported. He said more than 26,000 hectares of narcotic crops had been destroyed this year and that, by the time crops matured, the remaining cultivated area was close to zero. He questioned the UN’s reliance on satellite imagery, arguing that a field visible before eradication does not necessarily survive to harvest, and demanded that UNODC publish its data sources, image dates, methodology and margins of error.
UNODC itself noted that the de facto authorities report eradicating 22,000 hectares this year, a different figure from the one given by the ministry spokesman.
What it means for Europe
For years, Afghan opium was the main source of heroin sold on European streets, including in Ireland. The UN says seizure data suggest traffickers’ stockpiles are running down, and its 2026 World Drug Report noted early signs of falling heroin supply in Europe. Experts have warned that heroin shortages can push users towards more dangerous synthetic opioids, while the latest survey suggests rising Afghan production could start to refill the pipeline.
UNODC’s executive director, Monica Juma, said the rise showed how hard it is to sustain cuts in cultivation “when poor farmers have no alternatives to feed their families.” She called for international support for farming communities, including alternative livelihoods, better agricultural infrastructure and access to markets, along with co-operation to break up trafficking networks.
What happens next
The next growing season will show whether this year’s jump is a one-off or the start of a sustained comeback. Key questions are whether the Taliban step up eradication, particularly in the north-east, whether aid for alternative crops materialises at a time of shrinking humanitarian budgets, and whether European police begin to see more Afghan heroin arriving. The dispute over the figures between the UN and the authorities in Kabul is also likely to continue.
Sources
- UN News: Afghanistan opium production jumps fivefold as farmers find ways round Taliban ban (29 October 2026)
- Pajhwok Afghan News: UNODC reports rise in opium poppy cultivation, production in Afghanistan; Qani rejects findings (29 October 2026)
- Foreign Exchanges: World roundup, October 29 2026 (29 October 2026)
Featured image: Opium poppies in Helmand -a.jpg by ISAF Headquarters Public Affairs Office from Kabul, Afghanistan, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.
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