Impact of Drought on Irrigated Wheat Cultivation in Afghanistan. A Multi-Temporal Analysis from 2017 to 2023

This paper presents the initial findings of wheat mapping activities conducted in 2023 as part of the Afghanistan Emergency Food Security Project, led by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations and supported by the World Bank. The study focuses on mapping irrigated wheat cultivation, analyzing data from 2017 to 2023 to assess the impact of recent drought years. Using Sentinel-2 imagery and a random forest classification model in the Google Earth Engine cloud computing platform, a pixel-based classification was performed. Results indicate a significant decrease in irrigated wheat acreage at national levels from 2017 to 2023.