Press Release

Construction Starts on Ghazi Boys High School and Sardar Kabuli Girls High School in Kabul

Kabul, Afghanistan  | Sunday, August 30, 2009

The United States Government and the United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS) have started construction work on the Ghazi Boys High School and the Sardar Kabuli Girls High School in Kabul, Afghanistan.  When completed in 2010, these USAID-funded schools will provide modern classrooms, laboratories, and other learning facilities for approximately 10,000 Afghan high school students.  The schools are being designed and constructed to international seismic safety standards to prevent tragic school collapses during earthquakes like those in Pakistan in 2005 and China in 2008. 

The final designs for both Kabul high schools fully comply with the 2006 International Building Code, which is considered the most stringent engineering standard in use today.  As a result, the Sardar Kabuli Girls High School will be the most structurally sound multi-story building in Afghanistan.  These design standards have also been incorporated in design modifications for Ghazi Boys High School and numerous other USAID building projects across the country.

UNOPS awarded the Ghazi Boys High School contract to EDE Construction Company, a Turkey-based contractor that has successfully completed several similar building projects in Kabul including the Ministry of Rural Rehabilitation and Development offices and the Headquarters of the Afghan Customs Directorate.  The contractor for Sardar Kabuli Girls High School, FCEC/UIP, is a joint-venture between a local Afghan-owned construction firm and a US-based project management and engineering firm.