CAIRO, January 1. /TASS/. The number of drug addicts in Afghanistan currently stands at 3.5 million, or 9% of the country’s 39-million population, Deputy Health Minister Abdul Bari Omar, appointed by the Taliban movement (outlawed in Russia), told a news conference in Kabul on Saturday.

"Three and a half million people in the country are addicts. Each of them takes a daily amount of narcotic drugs about three US dollars’ worth," the local television channel TOLONews has quoted Omar as saying.

According to the United Nations, the area of farmland used for the illegal growing of opium poppy in 2020 expanded by 37% in contrast to the previous year. This is the third highest parameter ever registered in the country. At the end of 2020 Afghanistan accounted for 85% of the world’s opium production, which yields about 6%-11% of the country’s GDP. At that moment the UN estimated the number of adult Afghans addicted to drugs at 2.4 million.

During the Taliban rule in 1996-2001 drug production and smuggling were the main source of their government’s revenue. Despite the creation of the High Commission for Drug Control at that time more than 96% of all opium poppy was grown in Afghanistan under the Taliban’s jurisdiction.