Article : https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/9/28/taliban-signs-preliminary-deal-with-russia-to-buy-gas-wheat
Just recently, the Taliban and Russia have signed a preliminary agreement to help the Taliban in their efforts to maintain food, and fuel supplies during their two-year ongoing drought. The deal consisted of two million tonnes of wheat, half a million tonnes of cooking gas, and a million tonnes of diesel and petrol. Although this deal is preliminary, both sides of the deal are planning on meeting soon in order to help begin the trade through finalizing the deals. Interestingly enough, the Russian government still has not, and will probably continue to not recognize the Taliban government, which took back power in 2021. 2021 was also when, even before the government takeover, the Russians and Taliban were discussing trade between each other.
Before thinking about anything else, I immediately want to suspect that the Taliban is obviously doing this for a reason. Not only when looking at the obvious trade for supplies during a tough drought, but also when looking at the country that they turn to during this time in order to secure those supplies. The two countries have an interesting history, with Russia having previously invaded Afghanistan in the seventies, lasting into the eighties, but also backing their government up until 1992. Trade between the two countries signifies their relationship, where they might not want to work together, but each of the countries has something to offer the other in a situation where both countries are going through rough times.
One of the reasons that I took this article, was because it is a great example of the Reciprocity solution to the collective goods problem. In this scenario, we can see that Russia is willing to help the new Afghan government by supplying food, oil, and gas. While we still don’t exactly know what the Russian government wants in return from this help, we can imply that they expect help in furthering situations either internationally or domestically. Perhaps this is related to the Russia and Ukraine War, and they are hoping this newly established Taliban government would be willing to help them out.