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Afghanistan's Taliban rulers destroyed the country's records as they were driven from power by U.S. forces in 2001.
The Texas A&M University System is helping to restore some of the information and build on it through a $4 million federal program.
The PEACE project -- Pastoral Engagement, Adaptation and Capacity Enhancement -- has the broad goal of improving the livelihoods of Afghanis, largely through agricultural efforts, said Paul Dyke, a senior research scientist at the Texas AgriLife Research & Extension Center in Temple.
"Agriculture is a major driving force in the country," Dyke said. "There has to be an understanding of the livestock industry there."
The U.S. Agency for International Development-funded project is in its third year. The agency lists the project's goals as improving satellite-based weather technology, boosting livestock quality, better understanding the local markets for livestock and teaching conflict-resolution skills to resolve land and access conflicts.
About 75 percent of Afghanistan consists of rangeland, according to USAID. An estimated 22 million livestock, mostly sheep and goats, roam that area, and about half are under watch of the war-ravaged country's traditional nomadic herdsmen, the Kuchi.
The PEACE project brings to Afghanistan the Livestock Early Warning System, a program developed by the A&M System that has been used successfully in Kenya, Ethiopia and Tanzania, Dyke said.
The program uses rainfall information and models of plants' growth and food value to create maps of information that, among other uses, provide weather forecasts. Market conditions for livestock are also produced, making it less likely for desperate livestock sellers to be conned by middlemen.
The program also teaches conflict resolution to herders. At the end of these teaching sessions, herders often exchange cell phone numbers with one another.
"It's important to the nomadic people to learn to settle their disputes without shooting each other," said Steve Whisenant, head of the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences' department of ecosystem science and management.
Texas A&M has two research scientists in the country from the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences. Catherine Schloeder and Michael Jacobs have also spent nearly a decade working with a nonprofit agency to help nomadic herders in Ethiopia and communities in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
Dyke said he expected funding for the program to continue. "For the amount of money invested compared to other programs, it will end up being a very successful program."
Partners in the PEACE project also include the Texas AgriLife Research Center for Natural Resource Information Technology, the University of California-Davis, The Norman Borlaug Institute for International Agriculture at Texas A&M University and Mercy Corps, a non-governmental organization that has had a presence in Afghanistan for more than two decades.
"There's a renewed emphasis in Washington toward putting time and resources, including non-military assistance, into Afghanistan to help stabilize that country and secure the future of the Afghan people," said Edwin Price, director of the Borlaug Institute.
