What does someone working in a primitive mine need with literacy? It would be a job that paid a lot better than subsistence farming and might allow that person to send their kids to school to become engineers.
Without railroads and highways, Afghanistan will never move forward. It should have been the first thing we did, and not only to link up cities, but to locations with large amounts of natural resources to build up some wealth and industry.
It was making training army difficult for American troops for example. Soldiers complained about it.
Such high illiteracy rates will make it impossible to build enough of management and general bureaucracy needed to build anything large. It will make it hard to train workers in technology. You won't build railroads nor roads, you won't mainten them either.
Primitive mines are not competitive. They are not producing enough to feed you. And hungry people won't save money for school. You need technology.
Without railroads and highways, Afghanistan will never move forward. It should have been the first thing we did, and not only to link up cities, but to locations with large amounts of natural resources to build up some wealth and industry.