Afghanistan workers given hope from revived cement factory – in pictures

Sacks of cement sit ready for delivery.

Factory workers sign in their attendance as they arrive for work.

Dadullah, an employee at the factory, works on one of the old machines.

Posing for the photo is Khuda Daad, the head of the laboratory at the Jabal Saraj factory.

The kitchen staff busy themselves preparing lunch to be served to the factory workers.

The Jabal Saraj cement factory is 75 kilometres north of Kabul, the capital city of Afghanistan.

Workers waiting to be served during their lunch break.

A factory worker takes a break.

Worker Dadullah stands in for a photo.

Abdul Salaam is an electrician at the Jabal Saraj factory.

A worker shovels coal to power the big machines at the factory.

A worker peers through a hole at an oven at the cement factory.

A worker observes a conveyer belt carrying broken rocks to be ground.

In Jabal Saraj, some 75 kilometres outside Kabul, an area short of industry and jobs, the locals are hoping that the relaunch of a cement plant built by Czech engineers in 1957 and closed down by the Taliban in 1995, can revive the industry after decades of war and destruction. But the outdated state-owned plant raises serious questions over whether it has a viable future unless a new, modern facility is built to replace it.