Afghanistan relies on importing hundreds of thousands of tonnes of liquefied gas a year, even though the north of the country holds considerable known natural gas resources. With the arrival of the cold season and rising demand for fuel, many families face heavy heating costs. The situation raises serious questions about the management of underground resources, the development of domestic production capacity, and the transparency of the Taliban’s contracts. Why does a country with such gas capacity remain dependent on imports, and why has this wealth failed to bring a lasting reduction in energy costs for the people?
The answer to this contradiction lies in the gap between underground reserves and the ability to extract, process, and distribute gas economically. Alongside technical limitations and a shortage of investment, the absence of effective public oversight of natural resource contracts and the questions surrounding the Taliban’s political legitimacy also matter. National resources should not become merely a matter of agreement between the ruling regime and investing companies; they must serve the interests of the people of Afghanistan.
Afghanistan has significant oil and natural gas resources, and an important part of this capacity lies in the north of the country, particularly in the Amu Darya basin and the fields around Jawzjan, Sar-e Pol, and Faryab provinces. According to a joint assessment by the United States Geological Survey (USGS) and Afghanistan’s Ministry of Mines in 2006, undiscovered conventional natural gas resources in northern Afghanistan were estimated at 15.7 trillion cubic feet, equivalent to roughly 444 billion cubic meters. The Yatimtaq gas field alone, east of Sheberghan, is said to hold about 25.8 billion cubic meters. Despite these resources, effective exploitation requires investment, drilling technology, refining equipment, and transmission networks. The deterioration of facilities in some fields, falling reservoir pressure, a shortage of spare parts, and technological limitations can reduce production and raise extraction costs. In addition, widespread gas leaks and the loss of tens of thousands of cubic meters per day cause major damage to the national wealth.
Annual Imports: A Dependence That Continues
Despite the Taliban’s claims, Afghanistan’s liquefied gas market remains dependent on imports, and annual consumption of this product is estimated at between 800,000 and 900,000 tonnes. According to United Nations (UN) data, Afghanistan imported about 830,000 tonnes of liquefied gas in 2024. The figure was close to 828,000 tonnes in 2023. The continuation of imports at this volume reflects, on the one hand, broad domestic demand and the importance of liquefied gas in meeting the country’s energy needs, and on the other hand highlights the dependence of Afghanistan’s market on foreign sources.
In 2025, Russia became one of the major suppliers of liquefied gas to Afghanistan. According to a report published by Reuters in December 2025, Russia’s liquefied gas exports to Afghanistan in the first 11 months of that year, including shipments from a Russian-Kazakh joint venture, reached about 418,000 tonnes. Compared with the same period of the previous year, this represents a 50 percent increase.
Russia’s reduced access to the European market following European Union (EU) restrictions, and a partial decline in Iran’s supply, have been cited as factors behind the shift in trade routes for this product. Alongside Russia, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, and Iran also play a role in supplying fuel to Afghanistan, although each country’s share changes across different periods. Afghanistan’s dependence on regional markets leaves the country vulnerable to price fluctuations, rising transport costs, changing trade routes, and supply restrictions.
The Taliban’s Gas Contracts
By signing oil and gas contracts, the Taliban have claimed that they have created the ground for increased domestic and foreign investment. One of these contracts concerns the Totimaidan oil field in Faryab province, which was signed with an Uzbekistani company in October 2024. According to an announcement by the Taliban’s Ministry of Mines and Petroleum (MoMP), the 10-year contract involves a projected investment of about one billion dollars, and exploration and investment activities were due to begin in the first phase.
However, the announced figure alone does not indicate that the projected capital has been fully paid or that production has been achieved on the promised scale.
In the Yatimtaq field as well, contracts for drilling and completing new wells have been awarded to domestic and foreign companies. Among them, in 2025, a contract to drill three gas wells was awarded to a Turkish company, with a declared value of about eight million dollars. Such projects can help increase production, but assessing their success requires the publication of information on the actual cost of drilling, daily production volume, gas quality, and revenue share.
In western Afghanistan, the contract for the Kashk-Tirpul oil field was announced in September 2026 between the Taliban’s MoMP and the Saudi company Delta International Energy. The initial investment in this project has been put at about 200 million dollars.
However, the main criterion for assessing these contracts is neither the number of signing ceremonies nor the large announced figures, but the amount of investment actually realized, the start of commercial production, the revenue generated for the public treasury, the transfer of technology, and the impact of these projects on the domestic market. According to reports, if new production remains limited to exploratory drilling and processing and distribution facilities are not developed, its impact on liquefied gas prices in winter will be limited. Furthermore, the text of the contracts and the financial obligations of the contracting companies are important matters that have been kept out of public view.
Afghanistan’s National Wealth: Who Has the Right to Decide?
Afghanistan’s oil and gas contracts are not merely an economic issue; they are directly linked to national sovereignty, public rights, and the interests of future generations. The Taliban have controlled the running of the country since August 2021 and lack domestic legitimacy. This regime has also still not been recognized by the international community, with the exception of Russia. This situation has raised serious questions about accountability and the democratic legitimacy of long-term decisions on natural resources.
Afghanistan’s natural resources are the property of the country’s people, and decisions on their long-term exploitation must be accompanied by transparency, independent oversight, and respect for the public interest. The absence of elected and independent institutions, and limited public access to contract information, increase the risk of opaque decision-making and the granting of concessions without adequate oversight.
In a credible process, major contracts should be drawn up on the basis of transparent competition, an independent assessment of reserves, a review of the technical and financial capacity of companies, environmental standards, and a clear dispute resolution mechanism. It should also be clear what the state’s share of revenue or production is, how taxes and royalties are calculated, and what guarantees exist to prevent damage to the public interest.
A Cold Winter: The Price of the Gap Between Resources and Public Welfare
As the cold season approaches, rising demand for liquefied gas puts greater pressure on low-income families. The final price of this product depends not only on the volume of domestic production; import costs, exchange rates, transport, storage, and the state of regional supply also affect it. Nevertheless, the lack of sufficient storage capacity and dependence on imports can intensify the effect of market fluctuations on consumers. For many families, a rise in gas prices means reducing fuel consumption or using less suitable heating sources. This situation shows that energy resource management must go beyond extracting and selling raw materials and must also include people’s access to safe and affordable fuel. Developing domestic production, modernizing gas fields, building processing and winter storage facilities, and monitoring the market could ease part of this pressure; however, achieving this requires multi-year planning, real investment, and professional management within a system that is legitimate and acceptable to the people.
Alongside the shortage of liquefied gas, another major challenge is the gap between underground capacity and the ability to turn it into accessible and affordable energy. The gas reserves in the north of the country, the Yatimtaq and Totimaidan projects, and the new contracts in western Afghanistan can lay the ground for economic development, but only if they are accompanied by transparency, real investment, and technical planning under a law-based system.
The Taliban regime has still not published verifiable information on proven reserves, production volume, the amount of investment realized, contract revenues, and the share allocated to the domestic market, and has hidden it from the people. Alongside this, independent oversight of the contracts and accountability for how national resources are managed are regarded as important and necessary, particularly because today’s decisions may affect Afghanistan’s economy for decades.
The measure of success for an energy policy is not the number of signed contracts or the billions of dollars in announced investment; it is the level of sustainable production, the reduction of unnecessary dependence on imports, the creation of job opportunities, the protection of reserves, and people’s access to energy at a fair price. Until underground wealth is turned into a tangible improvement in citizens’ lives, the contradiction between Afghanistan’s gas resources and the cold in people’s homes will persist.
You can read the Persian version of this report here:
قراردادهای میلیاردی طالبان؛ چرا بهای گاز مایع همچنان رو به افزایش است؟
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