Drugs!
Thursday, May 29, 2008
According to a report released today by the National Security Network (NSN), Afghanistan's poppy crop, in terms of the acreage of land used for its cultivation, goes beyond anything Colombia's cocaine kings would dare to dream.
It's the country's largest export, worth more than $4 billion per year and employing some 3.3 million Afghans. The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime reported that last year's harvest was of "unprecedented size in modern times and unseen since the opium boom in China during the nineteenth century." So much for the War on Drugs.
The facts are stunning: in 2001, after a Taliban ban on poppy cultivation, Afghanistan only produced 11 percent of the world’s opium. Today it produces 93 percent of the global crop; the drug trade accounts for half of its GDP; and nearly one in seven Afghans is involved in the opium trade. In Afghanistan, more land is being used for poppy cultivation than for coca cultivation in all of Latin America.
It's the country's largest export, worth more than $4 billion per year and employing some 3.3 million Afghans. The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime reported that last year's harvest was of "unprecedented size in modern times and unseen since the opium boom in China during the nineteenth century." So much for the War on Drugs.
The facts are stunning: in 2001, after a Taliban ban on poppy cultivation, Afghanistan only produced 11 percent of the world’s opium. Today it produces 93 percent of the global crop; the drug trade accounts for half of its GDP; and nearly one in seven Afghans is involved in the opium trade. In Afghanistan, more land is being used for poppy cultivation than for coca cultivation in all of Latin America.
