The lure of easy drug money is trumping political ideology as "narco-cartels" emerge in Afghanistan's heroin trade, says a UN report.
The report warns the country's lucrative opium economy, viewed mainly as the financial fuel for the ideologically driven anti-government insurgency, was giving rise to "narco-cartels" in an evolution similar to what Colombia experienced with leftist guerrilla groups such as the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia and cocaine.
"The world over, drug money eventually trumps ideology and becomes as addictive as the dope itself," Antonio Maria Costa, executive director of the UN's office on drugs and crime, says in the report.
"After years of collusion with criminal gangs and corrupt officials, some insurgents are now opportunistically moving up the value chain: not just taxing supply, but getting involved in producing, processing, stocking and exporting drugs."
The narco-cartels would add another troubling dimension to an already unstable country, he wrote, adding, "Opium remains a major source of income in one of the world's poorest and most unstable countries. Farmers may grow it to stave off poverty. Criminals, insurgents and corrupt officials surely engage in its trade in the common pursuit of greed and power."
The Afghanistan Opium Survey 2009, written by the United Nations Office on Drugs & Crime, reveals poppy cultivation increased in the Canadian military's theatre of action in Afghanistan, while the rest of the country saw a decline in poppy crops.
Opium cultivation in Kandahar, the province where the Canadian military is based, rose by 35% to 19,811 hectares between 2008 and 2009 as 5,188 more hectares were used to grow poppies. The increased poppy cultivation also fuelled a 52% rise in opium production, which reached 1,159 metric tonnes in the province.
Nationwide, the report found opium "cultivation, production, workforce, prices, revenues, exports" declined for the second year in a row.
"The bottom is starting to fall out of the Afghan opium market," said the report's executive summary, written by Mr. Costa.
To try to reduce poppy production, Canada is contributing $55-million to UNODC in 2007 -11. Much of that money is being spent to help to build the capacity of Afghanistan's special anti-narcotics police and to interdict precursor chemicals of Afghanistan's
BY THE NUMBERS
Market forces are playing a role in declining poppy cultivation and opium production. Oversupply of the crop and lower market penetration in Europe depressed poppy prices significantly in 2009.
800,000
Reduction in the number of people involved in poppy growing in Afghanistan.
$3,562
Farmers' gross earnings per hectare. Down from $4,662.
$48
Wholesale price for fresh opium, per kilogram. Down from $70 a kilo.
$64
Price of dried opium per kilo. Down from $95.
$438-million
Total farm value of opium. Down from $730-million.
$10.7-billion
Afghanistan's gross domestic product.
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