By Shoryu Zaman-Das
As you already know, deforestation can severely affect the environment, and can cause the loss of many trees and plants. A human reason as to why trees are being cut down is for the growth of illegal drugs. Every year, “Narco Traffickers” (Narco literally meaning dope) are cutting down parts of rainforest and using them to grow drug content, like “Coca”, which is the main ingredient in cocaine. We’ll explore where “coca” is grown, what else the Narco Traffickers are getting up to, and most importantly, how we are stopping this horror practice from occurring in the first place. Deforestation is harmful, not only to the environment, but to the people as well.
The Narco Traffickers produce illegal drugs, mostly cocaine (which is punishable by public execution in Saudi Arabia). The land that they produce from is often deforested land in economically and socially unstable countries. This allows them to simply bypass laws, if there are any, which ban the production of drugs. The places traffickers are located and the coca is planted are often very remote, and hard to reach. These places are quite small because coca is a unique plant that produces lots of leaves in a small area. Because of the difficulty in reaching the plantations, many authorities have given up in their hunt to track Narco traffickers, and have let the traffickers continue their illegal trade.
There are many countries that produce coca leaves, but there is a main emphasis on South America, as coca in a native plant. Besides South America, many Central American nations, like the Honduras, produce large amounts of coca. With the coca, traffickers send it upward through Central America and Mexico where it is processed, and turned into the infamous drug COCAINE. Small amounts of the cocaine is sold to back Central American countries, but most of the shipment moves on and gets transported in underground tunnels towards the United States, the world’s largest cocaine market.
Growing prohibited drugs and cutting down trees are not the crime that traffickers commit. They have known to threaten locals and offer bribes to authorities to ensure that the truth is unheard. In unstable countries, this is an unwelcome practice, and in the Honduras, (whose forest loss has multiplies 50 times between 2004 and 2011, coinciding with an increase of coca movements) the homicide rate is now the highest in the world, with 85.5 people in 100,000 being murdered in 2012. This has terrified locals to act and report illegal activity to already bribed authorities, paid to keep their mouths closed.
In conclusion, as coca plantation is now slowing again since peaking in 2011, we know what traffickers get up to when they cut down trees for the growth of illegal drugs, and this is one of the causes pushing deforestation along. We also know the target areas where deforestation and coca growth collide, and most importantly, we know how to curb the cutting down of trees related to growing drugs. Hopefully, drug growth will slow to a halt, bringing deforestation down with it…
Sources:
6. Pages
44-47, Columbia coca cultivation survey - United Nations Office of Drugs and
Crime 2004
Image Sources
2. http://www.earth.columbia.edu/sitefiles/image/press_room/press_releases/2010/deforestation_300.jpg
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