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Where is Afghanistan?
About Afghanistan
The Land
The People
Life and Death
Health, Energy and the Environment
Education and Work
Travel, Communication and the Media

Afghanistan is a large country in south west Asia.

Afghanistan is a landlocked country and has no coastal borders.

The land is mostly mountains with plains in the north and south west.

The geographical coordinates for the centre of Afghanistan, also known as lines of latitude and longtitude, are:-
Latitude - 33 00N
Longitude - 65 00E

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Check the weather in Jabul Saraj now. It is about 70kms north of Kabul.

This is the time in Kabul now

The Afghan flag is 3 equal vertical stripes of black, on the flag pole side, red and green. In the centre of the red strips, and slightly overlapping the other two stripes, is the national emblem.

The capital of Afghanistan is Kabul.

Afghanistan is a presidential republic with a president as head of state and head of the government.

In elections everyone over the age of 18 can vote.

The currency in Afghanistan is the Afghani.

Afghan Persian and Pashto are the official languages.

Hear the National Anthem


These are the anthem words

The words ×

These are the words to the Afghan National Anthem called National Anthem. It was adopted as the National Anthem in 2006. This is a translation of the words.

If anthem fails to play click here

This land is Afghanistan
It is pride of every Afghan
The land of peace, the land of sword
Its sons are all braves

This is the country of every tribe
Land of Baloochs, and Uzbeks
Pashtoons, and Hazaras
Turkman and Tajiks

With them, Arabs and Gojars
Pamirian, Nooristanian
Barahawi, and Qizilbash
Also Aimaq, and Pashaye

This Land will shine for ever
Like the sun in the blue sky
In the chest of Asia
It will remain as heart for ever

We will follow the one God
We all say, Allah is great (repeat two more times)

We have already written our own history of England but are asking schools in Afghanistan to provide us with a detailed history of their own country. Check how here.


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The total land area of Afghanistan is 652,230 sq kms which is the 12th largest in Asia.

Afghanistan has no lakes, rivers and canals.

Afghanistan has boundaries with 6 countries

• Pakistan 2,670 kms
• Tajikstan 1,357 kms
• Iran 921 601 kms
• Turkmenistan 804 kms
• Uzbekistan 144 kms
• China 91 kms

Afghanistan has no coastline.

The highest point in Afghanistan is Noshak at 7,492 metres.

The pie chart below shows how the land is split between agricultural land (crops and pastures), forests and other, which can be towns, villages, desert or frozen waste called tundra.

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The total population of Afghanistan is 33.33 million people, making it the 16th largest country in Asia by population.

Of this number 16.43 million are females and 16.90 million are males.

A person from Afghanistan is called a Afghan.

To be a citizen of Afghanistan, one of your parents must have been born in and continously lived in Afghanistan. It is not sufficient to be born in Afghanistan. You have to live in Afghanistan for 5 years before you can begin to apply for citizenship.

The largest five cities in Afghanistan, by population are:-

• Kabul 3,043,532 people
• Kandahar 391,190
• Mazari Sharif 303,282
• Herat 272,806
• Jalalabad 200,331

For each country we will give you a diagram showing the population density. This is the average number of people for each square kilometre. Each little Owlbut is 1 person and the big yellow rectangle is 1 sq km. After a while you can compare countries and see which ones are the most crowded. Remember it is only an average as more people live closer together in towns and cities than in villages out in the country.



26.7% of the people live in cities or towns.

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The birth rate in Afghanistan is 38.3 births per 1,000 of population

The death rate in Afghanistan is 13.7 deaths per 1,000 people.

Check this against the birth rate. If the death rate is higher than the birth rate then the population will decrease unless immigrants arrive in the country.

There are 105.0 deaths of girls under 1 year per 1,000 of births and 120.3 deaths of boys.

The median age for females is 18.9 and for males is 18.8. The median age is that age which divides the population exactly in half so there are the same number of people above the median age as below it.

The average age of a woman when she has her first child is 19.9.

The elderly dependency ratio is 4.7. This is the number of elderly people (ages 65+) per 100 people of working age (ages 15-64).

The potential support ratio is 21.2. This is the number of working-age people (ages 15-64) per one elderly person (ages 65+). As a population ages, the potential support ratio tends to fall, meaning there are fewer potential workers to support the elderly.

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Afghanistan spends 8.2% of its total income on health care.

There are 0.27 doctors per 1,000 people.

There are 0.5 hospital beds per 1,000 people.

5.5% of the population are estimated as obese.

78.2% of the urban population and 47.0% of the rural population have drinking water that is either piped into their home or they have access to a public tap, a protected borehole, well, spring or protected rainwater collection facility.

45.1% of the urban population and 27.0% of the rural population have access to a flushing toilet that is connected to a sewer. a pit latrine (that is a permanent hole in the ground that is looked after) or a composting toilet.

Afghanistan releases 7.4 million metric tons of carbon dioxide by burning fossil fuels in the process of producing and consuming energy. This puts it as the 41st highest in Asia.

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Afghanistan spends 3.4% of its total income on education.

Children usually start school at age 6 in Afghanistan. Primary education is for seven years until age 13 and secondary education must continue till 15 but can go on to 19. This may be followed by further education at a university or college.

Generally the school year starts in the first week of March and finishes in December,

24.2% of females 52.0% of males are able to read and write by the age of 15.

We have no figures for the number of people aged between 16 and 24 who are not in work.

The total number of people available for work in Afghanistan is 7.98 million.

They work in the following sectors.

• Agriculture includes farming, fishing and forestry work
• Industry includes mining, manufacturing, construction and energy workers
• Services is everything else

35.0% of the workforce are unemployed.

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There are 25 paved airports in Afghanistan, which is the 24th highest number in Asia.


There are no railways in Afghanistan.


There are 12,350 kilometres of roads in Afghanistan, which means Afghanistan is in 29th place for the most kilometres of roads in Asia.

There are 9 major national newspapers in Afghanistan.

There are 21.60 million mobile phone users.

1% of the people have a fixed landline.



3.53 million people have access to the internet at home via any device (computer or mobile).

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