Student Success Stories
David Iba
Sorting out Utah Valley University senior David Iba’s summer job description in Washington D.C. takes a bit of time. And maybe an atlas.Iba served as an intern under the deputy chief of mission and political counselor of Afghanistan at the Afghan Embassy in Washington, where he used his Portuguese language skills to help the embassy improve relations with Brazil.
“It was a really odd sequence of events to speak Portuguese for the Afghans,” he said from the office of UVU’s student newspaper, the UVU Review, where Iba is the editor-at-large.The 27-year-old English major from Farmington, Utah met Deputy Chief M. Ashraf Haidari when the Afghan diplomat spoke at UVU last year. Iba was along to photograph Haidari for the UVU Review and inquired about internship opportunities.
Not long after, he was at the embassy.
“I attribute it (the internship) totally to working at the paper,” Iba said. “It was a huge opportunity.”
Once in Washington, Iba found himself not making coffee or copies for the embassy, but taking on substantive work since Afghanistan’s embassy has only eight employees and relies heavily on interns.
“It was such a fast pace,” he said. “I felt like my work was meaningful and will really make a difference.”
Iba’s biggest project was looking at ways to improve relations with Brazil, and it didn’t take him long to settle on agriculture as an area that could bridge the gap. Since Afghanistan produces about 80 percent of the world’s poppy – the plant used to make heroin – the country is heavily dependent on the drug trade to prop up its ailing economy and foreign food aid to feed its citizens. That illegal market is also a boon for the Taliban, who benefit from the drug trade.
“We’re trying to get farmers from Brazil to Afghanistan,” Iba said, referencing a similar program Brazil employs in the African nation of Angola. “The goal is to get them to grow their own food.”
In addition to food staples, Iba researched crops the poverty-stricken nation could grow to replace the income brought by poppies and found that both almonds and pomegranates would grow in Afghanistan’s often harsh climate.
The work wasn’t just rewarding for Iba but for his employers as well, who have offered him a tentative position in Brazil after his graduation next semester as Afghanistan completes an embassy there.
Though Iba acknowledged that a contentious election still being decided in Kabul could change the status of his offer, he’s optimistic that he’ll get to continue his work in the country where he served a two-year LDS mission before coming to UVU.
“They said I’ll be the first person they call,” Iba said.
And when opportunity came knocking for Iba, he said his time at UVU left him well-prepared to make the most of it, especially in light of one of the lessons he learned in Washington this summer.
“Writing is more important than I ever imagined,” he said. “UVU has definitely been an influence of good in my life, especially in my writing skills.”
Iba said he hopes interning at the Afghan embassy and working to create one in Brazil will set him apart when he comes back to America to attend law school in a few years.
“I think having that on my resume would help,” he said.