Date: 16/10/1403

On the second day of Afghanistan’s domestic products exhibition in Kandahar, local sources reported that women were barred from participating. The three-day exhibition, hosted in Kandahar and featuring representatives from around 150 manufacturing factories nationwide, displayed a wide range of domestic products, including embroidery, food items, tools, jams, and handmade clothing.

Despite women producing many of the goods on display, they were not permitted to attend or represent their work. Basir Ahmad Khpalwak said he participated in place of his wife, who made the products: “My wife is a businesswoman, but she was not allowed to participate, so I came instead.” Similarly, the son of another female producer attended on behalf of his mother, who produces embroidered goods.

The exhibition’s organizing office confirmed that all participants were men, and another exhibitor noted that the absence of women reduced the exhibition’s success. While local Taliban officials did not issue a specific statement on the ban, the exclusion aligns with broader Taliban policies restricting women’s participation in public economic life.

The exclusion of women from the domestic products exhibition in Kandahar demonstrates the systematic erasure of women from public economic life under the Taliban. By barring women producers from representing their own work—even while allowing their products to be displayed—the Taliban reduce women to invisible laborers while appropriating their economic contributions. This practice reinforces gender segregation, undermines women’s entrepreneurship, and signals that women’s economic participation is permissible only when mediated through male guardians